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. 































































































































































































































THE 


AGREEMENT 

OF 

Science and Revelation 


Rev. JOS. H. WYTHE, M. D. 


“The word, of the Lord is tried.” — Ps. xviii. SO. 


SECOND EDITION, REVISED. 




/ V 


- N Jo s<2,Q 


Of 

PHILADELPHIA 
J. B. LIPPINCOTT & CO. 

1877. 

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" The Bible, as the Book of books, is as the sun in the center of all 
other religious records; the Kings of the Chinese, the Vedas of India, 
the Zendavesta of the Persians, the Eddas of the Germans, the Jewish 
Talmud, and the Mohammedan Koran ; judging all that is hostile in 
them, reconciling and bringing into liberty whatever elements of truth 
they may contain. . . . 

“As the ideal Cosmos of the revelation of salvation, it forms with the 
Cosmos of the general revelation of God an organic unity. (Ps. viii., xix., 
civ.) It is the Key of the World-Cosmos, while this again is the living 
illustration of the Cosmos of the Scripture.’’ 

LANGE : General Introduction to the Old Testament. 


Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1S72, by 
REV. JOS. H. WYTHE, M. D., 

In the Office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington. 


PREFACE. 


The present work is designed to supply a want 
long felt, not only by the readers of scientific books, 
but also by Christian ministers and people. It is an 
attempt to exhibit in brief compass the true relations 
and harmony of Nature and Revelation, by present- 
ing some of the analogies between the truths of the 
supernatural world and the researches of history, 
astronomy, geology, and physiology. It claims that 
Science and Faith mutually support each other, — 
that the many-colored coat of infidelity is a patch- 
work taken from an effete and unscientific heathenism, 
—that the Bible is a record of the original faith of 
mankind and of its development in history, — that the 
principles of biblical interpretation must be based on 
the modes of Divine revelation, — and that the biblical 
doctrines concerning God, the creation, the human 
soul, the need of a Mediator, the faith-faculty, and 
the resurrection of the dead, are in perfect accordance 
with true science. 

A terse, simple style has been attempted, in hope 

( 3 ) 


4 


Preface. 


of rendering the work useful both as a text-book for 
the student and as a collection of essays on topics of 
more than ordinary interest at the present day. A 
few technicalities were unavoidable: hence a Glossary 
of Scientific and Theological Terms has been ap- 
pended. The analyses of the chapters, and a copious 
Index, also, will be found useful. 

As to the doctrinal statements or scientific facts 
and principles referred to, information has been 
sought from reliable sources and is presented with 
the freshness of thorough conviction. Where practi- 
cable, indebtedness to others has been acknowledged, 
either in the text or the margin. 

By an exhibition of the harmony and essential 
unity of plan in all God’s works, natural and super- 
natural, we seek to add to the living stream of 
Christian evidences, whose volume increases from 
age to age. 


PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION. 


The sale of more than two thousand copies of the first 
edition, the introduction of the work into the course of 
study for junior ministers of the M. E. Church, and the 
many favorable notices from the press of different de- 
nominations of Christians, are sufficient evidences of 
the utility of this book. The author desires to record 
here his sense of gratitude to the Giver of all good, 
who has enabled him in some degree to serve the cause 
of religious truth. Some additional matter has been 
added to the present edition, chiefly relating to the 
antiquity of man, the theory of evolution, and the 
doctrine of a Mediator. 

5 

1 * 




CONTENTS, 


CHAPTER I. 

PAGE 

Relation of Science and Faith n 

CHAPTER II. 

The Variations of Skepticism 33 

CHAPTER III. 

The Record of Faith 53 

CHAPTER IV. 

The Interpretation of the Record 89 

CHAPTER V. 

The Revelation of God 119 

CHAPTER VI. 

The Creation 149 

CHAPTER VII. 

The Spiritual Nature of the Soul 179 

( 7 ) 


8 


Contents. 


CHAPTER VIII. 

PAGB 

The Doctrine of a Mediator 217 

CHAPTER IX. 

* 

The Faith-Faculty in Man 241 

CHAPTER X. 

The Resurrection 261 

Glossary of Scientific and Theological Terms 283 


Index 


301 


CHAPTER I. 

THE RELATION OF SCIENCE AND FAITH, 


Faith is . . . the evidence of things not seen.” — S t. Paul. 


( 9 ) 



■ 







CONTENTS. 

Definitions — General Relation of Faith and Science — Different Re- 
ception of Religious Faith and Hypothetical Speculations of Science 
— Pantheistic Objections to the Supernatural examined — Arguments 
against Pantheism from Physical, Mental, and Moral Science — De- 
istic Objection to the Possibility of Miracles examined — Evidence 
of Christian Truth various — Character of Modern Infidelity — The 
Materials for settling the Question of the Harmony of Nature and 
Revelation are complete. 


(io) 


CHAPTER I. 


RELATION OF SCIENCE AND FAITH. 

A definition is not only a stepping-stone to truth, 
but also a revealer of fallacies. Like the spear of 
Ithuriel, it has caused many a concealed temptation or 
doubt to assume its true shape and proportions. In 
the investigation of religious truth it is especially 
necessary to define the leading terms employed, in 
order to insure clearness of mental vision. What, 
then, is the meaning of Science, and what of Faith ? — 
terms often used, and essential to our present inquiry. 

Lexicographers define Science as certain knowl- 
edge, or, in a more particular sense, as a collection 
of the general principles or leading truths relating to 
any subject, arranged in systematic order. This term, 
though often loosely applied, is seldom misunder- 
stood. It is different, however, with the term Faith. 
Sometimes it is used as a synonym for the word 
Belief, meaning a persuasion of the truth of a decla- 
ration, proposition, or alleged fact, on the ground 
of evidence. At other times, and chiefly by theo- 
logians, it is used to express confidence, or such 
trust as influences the affections and conduct. Both 
senses seem to be derived from the primary meaning 
of the original word, which, according to Webster, is 
to strain, to draw, and thus to bind or make fast. 

(") 


12 


Faith necessary to Science . 

The Apostle Paul says, “Faith is the substance 
( uizoffzaat : ; — a being set under, a realizing) of things 
hoped for, the evidence (eAev/«c- — persuasion, convic- 
tion) of things not seen.” 

From the definition it is evident that the spheres 
of Faith and Science differ. Science relates to the 
known, Faith may refer either to the known or the 
unknown. If we use the term Faith in the sense 
of either belief or trust, it will apply to known or 
scientific truths as well as to those based on testi- 
mony or revelation. Indeed, there can be no science 
without faith. Deduction, induction, and testimony, 
the very pillars of science, appeal to faith, and are 
impossible without it. Mathematical axioms are 
called self-evident propositions, but they are so be- 
cause with the present structure of our minds they 
compel our faith. The objects of faith may be 
also the objects of science, or they may be things 
unknown to science. These latter, again, may be- 
come objects of science without ceasing thereby 
to be objects of faith. “ Science has in many 
things altered the standpoint or extended the do- 
main of faith, but has never rendered faith un- 
necessary. It has enlarged the faith of childhood 
into the faith of manhood, but every hint of light 
which it has discovered has pointed out a great 
gloom beyond.”* Into that gloom of the unknown 
the eye of faith pierces, from thence it hears voices 
of truth which are as yet inaudible to science. The 


* Ecce Deus. 


Faith a Necessity for Man. 13 

spirit of science may incline a man to doubt, but 
not necessarily to unbelief. It weighs, disputes, ex- 
amines, deduces, experiments; but its generalizations 
are all inferences of faith. The majority of scientific 
truths are accepted by‘ faith in the testimony of 
others ; few, comparatively, are verified by personal 
experiment. It is usually a sufficient authentication 
of a scientific fact if it be published by recognized 
authority and is consistent with other known facts. 
In this manner science is propagated by faith. It is 
the nature of faith to be constructive; it educates or 
draws on the mind to the knowledge of truth. First 
faith, then science, then understanding; such is the 
progress of the mind towards a knowledge of the 
truths of nature or religion. To lose faith in sight is 
the constant hope of the instructed Christian. “ For 
now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to 
face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even 
as also I am known.” Unbelief is essentially de- 
structive. Its object is to pull down, not to build 
up, and it is really as much opposed to science as to 
religion. Few, if any, minds have been possessed 
with the full spirit of unbelief. It is too unsatisfactory, 
as well as too malignant. Man must have belief of 
some kind, or existence would be insupportable. It 
would be useless to attempt to argue with unbelief; 
we address ourselves, therefore, to the spirit of inquiry 
and examination, — to the scientific spirit; we desire 
an investigation of the consistency of the leading doc- 
trines of Christianity with what we know of the world 
around us. We would bring Faith, as taught by the 
2 " 


14 


Opposition to Faith unscientific. 


Bible, and Science, as instructed by deduction and 
experiment, face to face. We would interrogate the 
witnesses, and see if, while preserving their indi- 
viduality, they do not agree to the same facts. 

Faith in axiomatic truths is readily admitted, be- 
cause of their necessity to explain the phenomena 
of the natural world. The demonstrations of mathe- 
matics and the experiments of physical science are im- 
possible without it. In like manner, faith in spiritual 
things is necessary to explain the phenomena of mind. 

The faith which relates to the external world, even 
if hypothetical, finds no special opposition from the 
votaries of modern science; on the contrary, their 
works abound with deductions and theories which 
have nothing but a problematical basis. Thus the 
speculations grounded on the supposition of a uni- 
versal ether, the unity of force, the atomic theory of 
chemistry, the inhabitability of the planets, etc., are very 
far from being demonstrations, yet the faith of philoso- 
phers remains unshaken, and, generally, unopposed. 

It is very different with respect to religious faith, 
or faith in the reality of the supernatural. For this 
the naturalistic school of philosophers can find no- 
thing but contempt. With a blind and unscientific 
adherence to preconceived opinion, they exhibit, under 
the false pretense of science, the same vulgar prejudice 
which so long hindered the progress and acceptance 
of physical discovery. With them the supernatural and 
the imaginative are synonymous, and are set aside with 
an ill-disguised sneer. Their philosophic structure 
rests upon the theory that the whole nature of things 


Pantheism. 


5 


is fixed and unalterable ; the opposite of the Platonic 
theory that nature is in constant flow; hence their 
negation of the supernatural. 

“Men,” says the Duke of Argyll, “who denounce 
any particular field of thought are always to be sus- 
pected. The presumption is that valuable things 
which these men do not like are to be found there. 
There are many forms of priestcraft. The same arts, 
and the same delusions, have been practiced in many 
causes. Sometimes, though perhaps not so often as 
is popularly supposed, men have been warned off 
particular branches of physical inquiry, in the sup- 
posed interests of religion. But constantly and habit- 
ually men are now warned from many branches of 
inquiry, both physical and psychological, in the in- 
terests — real enough — of the Positive Philosophy! 
‘Whatever,’ says Mr. Lewes, ‘is inaccessible to reason 
should be strictly interdicted to research.’ Here we 
have the true ring of the old sacerdotal interdicts.”* 

At the present day, faith in the supernatural is re- 
jected by the pantheists, who regard the universe as 
the evolution of absolute being, and by the deists, 
who consider the order of nature so perfect as to 
imply immutability and inviolability. Let us exam- 
ine these theories by the test of reason and an ap- 
peal to facts. 

By what process of reasoning do any persuade 
themselves that nature is self-evolved, and- not the 
product of a Supreme Intelligence ? How comes it 


* Primeval Man. 


1 6 Faith welcomes Science. 

to pass that any human intellect can conceive that 
contrivance, and thought, and feeling are the product 
of unintelligent, insensible matter ? 

The principal, if not the only, argument on which 
such theorists rely, is drawn from the advance of 
science. Day by day science contracts the sphere of 
the unknown in the world around us, and enlarges 
that which is known. Imaginary theories are ex- 
ploded, as the forces which act upon matter and 
their modes of action are brought to light. Our 
philosopher deems it therefore reasonable to suppose 
that when our knowledge of nature is perfected we 
shall see sufficient reason for the existence and de- 
velopment of all things in the universe itself, without 
resorting to the idea of a cause separate and apart 
from the universe. 

But is this true, or even rational ? If our knowl- 
edge of nature were perfect, would it disprove an order 
beyond and above nature? The very idea of the 
supernatural presupposes natural order and laws. 
Nature and the supernatural might coexist, and our 
knowledge of one be perfect while we know nothing 
of the other. That we may know the supernatural, 
it must reveal itself in the sphere of the natural. The 
reality of such revelation is a subject to be examined 
in a true spirit of scientific inquiry. Faith in the 
supernatural has nothing to fear from the enlarge- 
ment of the domain of science. It can afford to wel- 
come every improvement of the faculties of the human 
mind, as tending to that perfection of reason which 
will fully qualify us for examining the foundation of 


Natural Science against Pantheism. 


17 

eternal truth on which it rests. As to the revelation 
of the supernatural, we shall inquire hereafter; it is 
sufficient here to show that the ground of pantheism 
is untenable and unscientific. 

It is the intoxication of scientific pursuit which so 
strongly attracts its votaries to the exclusive study of 
nature as to limit human faculties to a narrow sphere, 
— one which excludes as unworthy all investigation 
outside its own limits. The dignity of reason should 
lead to broader views. Yet, forsooth, these are the 
men who give the name of narrow-mindedness to the 
generalization which includes heaven as well as earth, 
and regard themselves as perfect just in proportion to 
the specialty of their pursuit. Such infatuation is as 
unscientific as it is foolish. It is not science which 
teaches pantheism, but ignorance and pride. 

Arguments against pantheism, and in favor of the 
supernatural, may be drawn from every branch of 
science, — physical, mental, and moral; although the 
reality of the supernatural must be learned by its 
revelations. 

Physical science exhibits the universe to us as a 
series of existences, arranged in such a manner, rank 
above rank, that one species is never witnessed trans- 
forming itself into another. No such development as 
pantheism pretends is ever seen in nature. The 
theories of spontaneous generation and of natural 
selection have not a shadow of experimental proof, 
while the general arrangement of nature presents a 
plan full of unity and intelligence, exhibiting the hand 
of a contriver in each of its parts. Life and organi- 
2* 


1 8 Morality against Pantheism. 

zation can never be explained by the development of 
material atoms, much less can intelligence. “ How 
should spirit be born of matter ? The appearance of 
life in the organic world was a new fact, or, to speak 
more correctly, an act of creation, for it could not 
leap from the insensate stone like the spark from 
fretted pebbles. The appearance of animal life was 
equally a new act, for plant never gave other than 
vegetable life. Surely from the life of the animal to 
that of the spirit the leap is more wide and sudden 
still, and creative energy must have manifested itself 
with greater glory to produce this higher form of 
life.” We shall examine the theory of development 
more closely hereafter ; at present we only refer to 
the verdict of not proved , which science has rendered 
against it, bringing us to the only alternative of a 
Great First Cause. 

Metaphysics repudiates pantheism ; for “ reason 
refuses to admit that the perfect and infinite of which 
it has the conception, can be inseparably bound to 
the imperfect and the finite ; that the imperfect and 
finite form part of God himself.” Again, the only 
element of pantheistic philosophy is inflexible, abso- 
lute fate. This is seen in all its forms, — in atheism 
and positivism, in the romancing of Renan, the sta- 
tistics of Buckle, and the speculations of the material- 
istic physiologists. The consciousness of freedom 
in the mind of man is an ever-living testimony against 
all such folly. 

The Freedom of the Will is the central point of 
attack by modern skeptics, yet “ the passionate ob- 


Morality against Pantheism. 19 

stinacy with which the declarations of the common 
sense of mankind are contested and every fragment 
of free self-determining power denied, serves to bring 
out more emphatically than before the marvelous and 
isolated character of that power of choice which all 
unprejudiced men know that they possess. When it 
comes to be fully appreciated, amongst the many, 
how rigid law rules not only all living as well as 
inanimate irrational creatures, but how even the 
immense majority of our own actions are simply 
automatic, the wonderful character of our power of 
(in certain cases) voluntarily choosing the less attract- 
ive of two competing objects will be less inadequately 
estimated. Moreover, the recognition in our own 
being of this power, beyond anything else in nature, 
renders supernatural action external to us not only 
credible, but to be anticipated a priori. . . . The bitter 
hostility which exists to the doctrine of man’s free- 
will is not difficult to understand. It is impossible 
to assert it without implicitly asserting religion ; and 
it is, in one aspect at least, a trial to pride. It is, 
indeed, no small trial to the pride of a highly-cul- 
tured man of powerful intellect to feel that the poorest 
peasant is fully as capable as himself of performing 
the highest actions — those which are the special pre- 
rogative of man — namely, the exercise of rational 
meritorious volition and choice. If there is such a 
thing as morality, it is beyond comparison as to value 
with mere intellectual culture or capacity, and it 
necessarily follows that a poor paralyzed old woman 
sitting in a chimney-corner may, by her good aspira- 


20 Morality against Pantheism. 

tions and volitions, be repeatedly performing mental 
acts compared with which the discovery by Newton 
of the law of gravitation is as nothing. Again, in 
free-will and morality, we have that which cannot be 
the result of mere brute inheritance. Conceptions 
of time and space may be plausibly represented as 
structural results of a practically infinite brute an- 
cestry which has been submitted to conditions of 
time and space, but at any rate such ancestry was 
never submitted to conditions of moral responsibility. 
Thus the recognition of the human will renders ab- 
surd the conception that man can have developed 
from a brute.” * 

President Edwards’s treatise on the Will has long 
been regarded as a most masterly presentation of the 
predestinarian argument. Dr. Whedon, however, in 
his work entitled “ The Freedom of the Will,” has 
thoroughly answered the sophism that the will is 
swayed by the strongest motives, as well as other 
arguments of Edwards. In the chapter entitled 
“ Freedom involves not Atheism,” he remarks, “that 
it will be very difficult to find exceptions to the rule 
that all atheists, pantheists, materialists, and pro- 
fessed fatalists are necessitarians.” Again : “ The 
doctrine that there is no soul and no will exempt 
from that same invariable sequency which rules the 
domains of physics, that there is no God who does 
not come under the same inflexible inalternative law 
with matter, levels the whole into one system of fatal- 
istic materialism. The subjection of human volitions 
to the same law eliminates responsibility, dispenses 


* Mivart’s Lessons from Nature, p. 380. 


Morality against Pantheism. 21 

with retribution, divine government, and human im- 
mortality.” 

Dr. Whedon shows that freedom must be held to 
exist until an unanswerable argument has proved its 
non-existence; that the common consciousness of 
mankind affirms it ; and that moral responsibility re- 
quires it. 

Thus the consciousness of free-will, uncontradicted 
by facts of physical science or by metaphysical rea- 
soning, protests against Pantheism, and proclaims 
that the personality of a Supreme God, and not fate, 
is the true fountain of force. 

“ The moral consciousness,” says Pressense,* to 
whom we are indebted for our train of thought, “pro- 
tests yet more loudly ; it could not survive the sup- 
pression of Divine order. It affirms it with author- 
ity every time that it enjoins the right on us and 
upbraids us for the wrong ; for what it commands is 
often that which we have no will to do, and what it 
condemns is that which our inclination has prompted. 
It is not, then, the simple echo of our hearts ; it 
speaks in the name of a law, which is neither that of 
our senses nor of our mobile and impassioned soul ; 
it brings us into the presence of another than our- 
selves, of one greater than ourselves, who has an ab- 
solute right over us, and its ‘ Thou shalf sounds yet 
above the wrecks of all our other convictions,' estab- 
lishing in us an immovable certitude. . . . Yes, the 
human soul believes in liberty, in responsibility, in 


* “ The Life and Times of Jesus Christ,” by E. de PressensS, D.D» 


22 Morality against Pantheism . 

law and its sanction; man believes that there is 
something which is the good, the true, the right, 
and some one who enjoins this upon him, renders 
it possible to him, and watches over its accomplish- 
ment. Pantheism, applied truly and upon a large 
scale, even by its best representatives, would cover 
with a plenary indulgence all infamies, would un- 
chain wholly the powers of evil, and render life im- 
possible.” 

The author just quoted exhibits the unreasoning 
inconsistency of pantheism in recognizing no cause 
free and transcendent to the world by referring to its 
fundamental principles. “ For it,” he says, “ there is 
no other absolute than the universe arriving at the 
consciousness of itself in our own reason. But evi- 
dently universal life does not begin with this highest 
form; it does not open with thought, which is rather 
like the flower of this vast development, for it is not 
the cause of it, but the product. That which is at the 
starting-point, at the origin of things, is not the idea, 
not mind, but abstract being, — an existence so vague 
as to be akin to non-existence. Thus the greater re- 
sults from the less, life from death or from inertia ; the 
immense column of universal existence springs from 
sheer nonentity. For what, in definite terms, is the 
abstract Being of Hegelianism, or that fathomless abyss 
whence the universe is made to arise, if it is not non- 
entity? Thus the famous axiom, ex nihilo nihil , cannot 
be applied 4o Christians, or to the spiritualistic phi- 
losophers who place absolute being before the world, 
but it falls with its whole weight on the systems of 


Deism. 


23 


pantheism. It is idle to suppose myriads of centuries 
bringing forms of existence out of this nonentity; 
time, as has been well said, has nothing to do with 
the question. Millions of years cannot make fruitful 
that which has itself no existence. Behold, then, a 
grand and gorgeous effect, — the world with its har- 
monies, humanity with its highest life, born not even 
of Thales’s drop of water, but of a void! Reason 
protests against such a doctrine, and to accept it she 
must deny the principle of causality, which is one of 
her essential elements.” 

The system of deism, in contrast with that of 
pantheism, admits a Great First Cause, intelligent and 
wise and powerful, the Author of the universe and 
its laws. It objects to religious faith, however, so 
far as it relates to a supernatural intervention into 
the established order of nature. In other words, the 
deist admits the existence of a Creator, but denies 
the possibility of miracles. Two arguments have 
been adduced to sustain this position: 1st. That the 
perfection and order of the universe imply the im- 
mutability of the laws of nature. 2d. That the very 
perfection of Divine wisdom forbids the idea that it 
is necessary for God to interfere with his own laws or 
retouch his own work. In both these arguments 
there is an implied supremacy given to the laws of 
nature, as if something more was meant by the term 
law than a mode of being or order of sequence; — as 
if, indeed, the laws of nature were superior to the 
Lawgiver who ordained them. As to the first, it is 
evident, upon the principle of deism, that before the 


24 Divine Freedom against Immutable Lazo. 

creation of the world there was law or condition in 
the Divine existence itself. God was sovereign, free, 
and independent. The free personality of the Divine 
mind was governed by essential Holiness and Wisdom. 
If in creating the world God has alienated his own 
liberty or enchained his own independence, the Divine 
order has been changed, and law is not immutable. 
If the laws of the creation are immutable laws of 
necessity, and not the ordinary exercise of creative 
freedom, then the independence of the Divine exist- 
ence has been destroyed by the act of creation, and 
that which was the law of nature is not now the law. 
The truth is, that the phrase “immutable laws of 
nature” is wholly incongruous when applied to the 
subject of supernatural interventions of Divine power. 
Such a phrase may suit an atheist, but not one who 
believes in a personal and fatherly God. The veiy be- 
ginning of nature, or creation itself, was a miracle. 
Each successive step of the world’s progress, as re- 
vealed to us in the rocks, or in the Bible, was miracu- 
lous. Life itself is continued in absolute dependence 
on Divine sovereignty. Besides, all the so-called laws 
of nature are not only reciprocal and interdependent, 
but have a certain rank or subordination, one to the 
other, and all are under the rule of Divine free agency. 
Thus the law of gravity acts upon a' stone in my 
hand, but the law of freedom in my will resists gravi- 
tation, and may cause the stone to mount high in 
the air, in opposition to the law of gravity It would 
be childish folly to argue against the reality of such 
a phenomenon that the order of the universe implies 


Creation not originally Complete . 25 

immutable law! Then my own volition is exerted 
under Divine supervision, and I am accountable for 
its exercise. “ The supernatural is the freedom of 
God, and it can only be abandoned, or at least its 
possibility contested, by abandoning the idea of a 
personal God.” 

Respecting the argument that God’s wisdom for- 
bids the necessity of interference, as if to retouch his 
own work, Pressense remarks, “The objection would 
hold good if we belonged to the world of necessity 
instead of to that of freedom.” But creation was not 
complete from the beginning. Successive interposi- 
tions of creative power manifestly point to the de- 
velopment of some plan not fully completed, and the 
appearance of man in the last geologic age elevates 
that plan to the sphere of moral and spiritual life. 
The deistic argument is as much opposed by the 
teaching of science as by the Scripture history. The 
latter shows us that the free creature had to de- 
termine his own destiny, — a fact which implies the 
possibility of evil. It is not God’s own work which 
He corrects when He miraculously interferes in re- 
demption, but a helping hand which He holds out to 
the creature made miserable by his own fault. “ If the 
fall is but a delusion, if evil is only the imperfection 
necessary to the harmony of the whole, I can under- 
stand the objections of the deist to miracles. But 
if it is true that God’s free creature is unhappy 
through his own fault, and has placed himself under 
the yoke of a calamity as tremendous as it is terri- 
ble, in the name of what principle can those who 
3 


2 6 The Freedom of God a Reality . 

recognize a sovereign Deity set aside the super- 
natural? After all, miracle, which must not be re- 
garded exclusively in its secondary manifestations, is 
nothing else than the intervention of the Divine free- 
dom to save man, conformably with the laws of moral 
order. What? You admit that God is free, is master 
of the creation which He called out of nothing, and 
yet to this free God you deny the right to arise from 
his rest to restore his fallen creature, because, to this 
end, He must needs break the chain of cause and 
effect, and introduce a novel fact in history? But 
if He cannot save, how could He, then, create? Crea- 
tion is apparently an act of love, which reveals the 
depth of his being. If you question his sovereign 
right to save his creature when fallen from happi- 
ness, you refuse Him that which is the very essence 
of his being; you impugn his moral immutability, 
which must be in no wise confounded with immo- 
bility or inertia. The supernatural is, then, not only 
the freedom of God, it is also his love. I know no 
other definition of it more rigorously exact. Of 
what avail would his freedom be to God, in the sense 
in which it is accorded by theism, if he were unable 
to use that freedom for good?” 

In the estimation of true science, one fact is worth 
a thousand theories, and the revelation of the super- 
natural is, and must be, a question of fact, to be 
judged of in the same manner as other facts, by 
historical testimony or experimental verification. If 
intercourse with heaven may be realized consciously 
by the devout and prayerful spirit, as the Bible 


Christian Evidence various . 


27 


teaches, then experience is the quickest as well as 
the surest test. If it can be proved that God has 
made a communication of spiritual ideas and prin- 
ciples, all our theorizing respecting the possibility 
of such a communication is at an end. 

The evidences of Christian truth upon which faith 
is based, are regarded by many as among the trials 
of our state of probation. With such a view of them 
they can never be considered as complete or final. 
Each age must review them from its own stand- 
point, every individual must examine them for him- 
self. What will produce conviction with one mind 
will not with another. To one, the external authen- 
tication of miracles and prophecy is all-sufficient to 
lead to his submission to the authority of Holy Writ. 
To another, the supernatural grandeur and moral 
excellence of the doctrines themselves, or of the life 
of Jesus, are all -convincing. Another regards the 
actual results as demonstrative of Divine power. 
With many, perhaps the most, the authority and 
influence of others — parents, teachers, legislators — 
lead to a ready acceptance of the truth. The Bible 
itself, whatever theologians may have done, rests its 
claims on no single evidence, or class of evidences, 
besides the saving influence of the truth it reveal^ 
upon the hearts and lives of those whe receive it. 
Jesus said, “By their fruits ye shall know them.” St. 
Paul declared the gospel to be the power of God 
unto salvation. And St. Peter addressed his fellow- 
Christians as those who had received the end of their 
faith, even the salvation of their souls. Throughout 


28 


Opposition various. 


the Scriptures, both of the Old and New Testaments, 
this experience of the power of truth upon the affec- 
tions and conduct is continually referred to. To 
many, however, the allusion to this kind of evidence 
is as a strange and unknown tongue; it becomes 
necessary, therefore, to meet the doubts and objec- 
tions which may be urged against the Christian re- 
cords, that men may be encouraged to accept and 
rely upon the truth revealed. 

The intensity and form of the opposition against 
the Scriptures vary at different times according to 
the amount of intellectual and critical activity em- 
ployed, or the moral character of the objectors. No 
man can live in Christian civilization without absorb- 
ing, it may be insensibly to himself, some of the light 
which is around him. Thus it happens that the un- 
belief of the present day differs in many respects from 
that of the last century. It is more mild and con- 
ciliatory. It is not disgraced by such low vulgarity. 
It is not made a matter of political agitation. It does 
not ridicule Christianity, nor does it altogether deny 
the facts of the Christian religion. It assumes a tone 
of candor and morality and fair dealing, and seems to 
wish to be recognized as an angel of light. It often 
becomes ultra-spiritualistic. There are, of course, 
localities where the old virulence and vulgarity break 
out under the guidance of men who are unfamiliar 
with the progress of modern ideas; but the skeptical 
literature of the present day is very different from 
that of the past. The spirit and tendency are the 
same, but the manner is different. Every age has 


New Forms of Objection improbable. 29 

had its own form of doubt or unbelief, which has 
been met and overcome by the advocates of truth, 
yet every succeeding age has renewed the contest 
on the same or other grounds, with the same result. 
The gospel of peace and good will is still the rallying- 
point of strife and division, and will be, doubtless, till 
the probation of the world is ended. The principal 
ground of conflict now is the consistency of Faith 
and Science. The deductions of Natural Science being 
regarded as fixed facts, men are inclined to make 
them a standard of all truth. It is therefore neces- 
sary to show the harmony and consistency existing 
between the Book of Nature and that volume which 
claims to be the Book of God’s revelation in human 
language. 

Such has been the progress of science and criticism 
during the present century that the materials for 
settling this question are doubtless complete. Enough 
of nature is known to enable us to judge of the har- 
mony of its principles and tendencies with the teach- 
ings of Scripture, and no new ideas on subjects 
traversed by the Christian religion, judging from the 
present state of scientific knowledge, are likely to 
appear. Mr. Farrar justly remarks, “ If the present 
examination of some of the subtler forms of matter 
or of force, and of their existence in other globes 
of the solar system than our own, should lead here- 
after to a generalization which shall extend natural 
philosophy as widely beyond its present limits as the 
discovery made by Newton beyond those of his pre- 
decessors, yet these discoveries can have no bearing, 
3* 


30 


The Plan proposed. 


favorable or unfavorable to religion, distinct in kind 
from that of present ones. If even a still mightier 
stride should be taken, and physiology be able to lay 
bare the subtle processes through which mind acts 
on body, yet the difficulty would only be an en- 
hanced form of that which is already used to dis- 
credit the spirituality and immortality of the soul.”* 
We address ourselves, therefore, to the consideration 
of the scientific consistency of the leading doctrines 
of the Bible. As merchants sometimes try their 
goods by holding them up before the sun, we shall 
endeavor to examine these doctrines by the light 
of modern science. We pursue this plan, not be- 
cause we consider science to be the test of spiritual 
truth, but because it affords abundant confirmations 
of that truth. Such confirmations will remove many 
difficulties which have existed in sincere minds, and 
lead to a better appreciation of more positive evi- 
dence. Christianity asserts authority over religious 
belief in virtue of its being a supernatural com- 
munication from God. It professes to teach positive 
truth in reference to religion. Has science proved 
its revealings to be untrue, or can it do so? Are the 
doctrines taught by the professed revelation con- 
sistent with the truths arrived at by demonstration 
and experiment? Such are the questions we propose 
to discuss. 


* Critical History of Free Thought. 


CHAPTER II. 

THE VARIATIONS OF INFIDELITY. 


' Sacred and inspired Theology is the sabbath of all our labors.” — Bacon. 


(SO 


CONTENTS. 


Christian Truth ancient — Reason without Revelation tends to Panthe- 
ism, Dualism, Materialism, or Pyrrhonism, as seen in Ancient Phi- 
losophies — Opposition to Truth the native Temper of Heathenism 
and Infidelity — Four Crises or Epochs in the Contest against Truth, 
and their Characteristics — Present Infidelity an Attempt to revive 
Ancient Cosmogonies — Has forsaken the Scientific Principles of 
Bacon — Various Forms of Skepticism prevalent. 


CHAPTER II. 


THE VARIATIONS OF SKEPTICISM. 

A brief review of the efforts of scientific inquirers 
to obtain positive religious knowledge, and of the op- 
position which their speculations maintained against 
the Christian system, will throw light upon the tend- 
encies and spirit of the present age, and show the 
necessity of the work before us. Whatever we may 
think of the scientific consistency of the teachings 
of Scripture, the candid verdict of the historian will 
be that infidelity has turned very far aside from the 
fundamental principles of true science. 

The sacred books of the Christian religion contain 
the earliest ideas of the human race, and the history 
of the development of the first germs of religious 
thought. It is evident, therefore, that the patriarchal 
faith, as exhibited in the Scriptures, must have tinc- 
tured all subsequent histories and philosophies, and 
given origin to many thoughts which would other- 
wise have been unknown. In this way many ancient 
traditions originated, retaining more or less of truth. 
It would be a tedious, yet not impossible, task to 
cull out of the various systems and traditions of man- 
kind the ideas which show a common origin. Much 
that is good and true has clung to teaching other- 
wise fanciful or impure, and if we could eliminate the 

( 33 ) 


34 Origin of Philosophic Theories. 

product of imagination from the religious ideas of 
nations, the remainder would correspond to the 
teaching of the earlier books of the Bible. 

The history of philosophy proves that whenever 
human reason has attempted to solve the question 
of the origin of things, which is fundamental to re- 
ligion, without taking for the basis of its efforts the 
truth contained in the Scriptures, it has become in- 
volved in the speculations of one or other of the 
following theories: Pantheism, which beholds in finite 
beings only forms, or modifications, of the infinite 
substance; Dualism, which divides being, or sub- 
stance, between two uncreated principles ; Material- 
ism, or Atheism, which in place of the Infinite One 
substitutes a sort of indefinite multiplicity by the 
concurrence of atoms ; or Pyrrhonism, which is syn- 
onymous with universal skepticism, and doubts all 
things. 

These theories are not new. In Grecian literature 
the power of thought developed itself in all direc- 
tions, and it is remarkable that all subsequent sys- 
tems, even in the most modern times, so far as they 
rest on specific fundamental differences, may be recog- 
nized as anticipated by the Greek philosophers. Even 
these latter were dependent upon germs of thought, 
which suggests to us the profound culture of a very 
early period of the world’s history. The Oriental 
philosophy, coming down to us from most ancient 
times, and embracing the speculations of the human 
mind in India, China, Persia, Chaldea, Phoenicia, and 
Egypt, presents a perfect parallel with the systems 


Temper of Heathenism and Infidelity . 3 5 

of Greece, which, in connection with the early history 
of that country, justifies the conclusion that the East- 
ern philosophy was the source of all subsequent 
speculation. 

Pantheism, in its most complete form, is found in 
the Vedas, or sacred books of India. It is found, also, 
in the philosophies of China and Egypt. In Greece 
it seems to have been first taught by Pythagoras. 

The Zendavesta of Persia is the oldest exponent 
of dualism, and represents the universe under the 
notion of a grand conflict. The dualism of Chal- 
dean philosophy exhibited it as an immutable har- 
mony. This theory shows itself in the Grecian phi- 
losophy of Thales and Anaxagoras. Atheism, or 
materialism, distinguishes some of the Buddhist 
schools in India, and appears in Greece in Anaxi- 
mander and Epicurus. 

Perfect skepticism cannot be met in argument by 
human logic, for every attempt to do so implies a 
certain principle on which it rests, and skepticism 
admits of no certain principle. It is invincibly repu- 
diated by human nature, however, as life repels death, 
for absolute skepticism would be the very extinction 
of reason. Yet this doctrine was taught by the 
Sophists, by Pyrrho, Sextus, and others. 

While the religious ideas and histories of the Bible 
were confined to the Jewish nation, or transmitted to 
other lands by patriarchal tradition, little or no op- 
position was excited against them. The founders of 
philosophic systems borrowed and moulded and 
altered these teachings at pleasure, to suit their own 


36 


Causes of Opposition. 


notions and designs ; but when, in the fullness of 
time, the patriarchal seed brought forth its fruit for 
the healing of the nations, and Christianity set up 
its claims as a universal and positive religion, and 
asserted its right to impose limits to the speculations 
of the human mind, a conflict might be naturally an- 
ticipated. The dispersion of the Jews during the two 
centuries preceding the Christian era, also provoked 
opposition, and the barbarous persecutions of Anti- 
och us, in his attempt to exterminate the religion of 
the Jews and substitute that of the Greeks,* is a pic- 
ture of the native temper of heathenism and infidelity 
which history has often seen repeated. The gospel 
breathes the spirit of peace and brotherhood. It 
teaches good will towards men. Yet its Divine 
Founder, foreseeing the antagonisms which would 
be excited against it, said, “ Suppose ye that I am 
come to give peace on earth ? I tell you nay ; but 
rather division.” The natural dislike of a sinful 
heart to the moral standard of the gospel, the influ- 
ence of prejudice or self-interest, the disgust excited 
by the corrupt lives of hypocritical and formal pro- 
fessors, the intolerance and heathenish spirit of a 
corrupt church, the intellectual doubts infused by 
some criticism or apparent scientific inconsistency, or 
some- other cause, real or fanciful, excites opposition ; 
and it is amazing to see with what virulence and zeal 
Christianity is denounced, and often persecuted. Yet 
nothing has been substituted in place of the teaching 


* I. Maccabees, i. 44; II. Mac. vi. 


Conflict with Heathenism. 


37 


of Scripture, by any skeptical system, down to the 
present day, save some modification of the theories 
already referred to, none of which have any scientific 
basis whatever, but are purely speculative. 

Four crises of Christian faith, in its struggles with 
infidelity, have been enumerated, as follows : 1st The 
conflict with heathenism and heathen philosophy from 
the second to the fourth century. 2d. The skeptical 
tendencies of scholasticism in the twelfth and thir- 
teenth centuries. 3d. The infidelity attending the 
revival of literature in the fifteenth and sixteenth cen- 
turies. 4th. Modern infidelity in three forms, — Eng- 
lish deism, French infidelity, and German rational- 
ism. The result of these forms the skepticism of the 
present day.* 

The first of these struggles grew out of the tend- 
encies of the heathen world to absolute unbelief, to 
bigoted attachment to a national creed, to philosophic 
theorizing, and to a mystical inclination for magic 
rites. 

The Epicurean school of philosophers inclined to 
a total disbelief of the supernatural. Lucretius was 
among the best of them ; but, notwithstanding the 
effort sometimes made to put a favorable interpreta- 
tion upon his language, the world was to him a scene 
unguided by Providence, and death uncheered by the 
hope of a future life. Mr. Pope’s “Essay on Man” 
is a reproduction of the skepticism of this school. 
Another example, of an opposite type, was Lucian, 


* Farrar’s Critical History of Free Thought. 
4 


38 


Christian Apologists. 


in the second century, the prototype of Voltaire. He 
seems to have had a universal ridicule for religion, 
and delighted in farcical caricature. It has been well 
remarked that human society has no worse foe than 
a universal scoffer, since such a one destroys not 
superstition only, but the very faculty of belief. To 
such minds Christianity is a mark for the same jests 
as other creeds. 

The attachment to heathen worship and magic 
rites, and a tendency to philosophic theorizing, gave 
rise to what is known as the eclectic school, of Alex- 
andria, or Neoplatonism, — the counterpart of our 
modern spiritualism. 

Lucian, Celsus, Porphyry, Hierocles, Julian were 
the writers who attacked Christianity during the 
period referred to ; and their arguments have been 
repeated in every subsequent age. The flippant wit 
of Lucian, which attributes religion to imposture, is 
repeated in Voltaire and Paine. The doubts of Cel- 
sus reappear in the English deists. The criticism of 
Porphyry is reproduced by modern exegesis. The 
disposition to regard Christianity as a product of the 
human mind, unsuited for men of superior knowledge 
and progress, is the parallel to Julian. Each of 
these champions of infidelity was met and his argu- 
ments fully overturned by the Christian apologists 
of that day. Tertullian, Justin, Origen, Eusebius, 
Athanasius, and Augustine, with many others, proved 
competent defenders of the faith. Yet the victory 
of the early church was not so much due to intel- 
lectual defenses as to moral influences. The common 


Scholastic Skepticism. 


39 


belief in magic and in oracles prevented the full 
force of the external evidence of miracles and pro- 
phecy ; but the internal evidences were most potent, 
— the doctrine of an atoning Messiah filling the 
heart’s deepest longings, and the lives of Christians 
embodying heavenly virtues. Thus will it ever be. 
The effect of this wonderful scheme of reconciliation 
which the Bible reveals upon the hearts and lives of 
those who truly accept it, is the strongest proof of its 
Divine origin. “ If a question of comparison be- 
tween this book and any other were started, Christ’s 
own standard of judgment would best meet the case ; 
looking forward to the false prophets who should 
seek to undo his work, He said, ‘ By their fruits ye 
shall know them.’ Modern civilization should be the 
field of research on both sides. Which book has 
done most for liberty, justice, progress? Which 
book has most persistently branded, defied, and 
threatened every form of tyranny ? Which book has 
done most for the poor man ? These inquiries may 
be put in no declamatory spirit, but simply with a 
view to the discovery of facts. The test is fair. It 
is marked by a high sense of honesty on the part of 
Jesus Christ. He adopts no method of overriding 
human judgment, but, on the contrary, elevates the 
discriminative faculty of man, and in a manner throws 
the responsibility of the conclusion upon men’s own 
common sense. This is not the plan of necromancers, 
soothsayers, and self-elected prophets. Christ appeals 
to his own works and the works of others, asking the 
verdict of the world upon their respective claims to 


40 


English Deism. 


truth and veneration. There is no cunning leger- 
demain, no rebuke of human severity in the exam- 
ination, no indulgence bespoken on behalf of the 
worker : the words and works are befofe you ; judge, 
then, said Christ, and ‘believe me for the very works’ 
sake.’”* 

During the Dark Ages, men were oppressed with 
the double incubus of feudalism and the popedom; 
but about the twelfth century there was both a social 
and an intellectual struggle for freedom, which finally 
culminated in the revival of literature and in the Re- 
formation. At this time skepticism revived, and the 
idea of progress in religion, in the sense that Chris- 
tianity is to be replaced by a better religion, was ad- 
vanced. Christianity was also compared with other 
religions, so as to attempt to obliterate its peculiari- 
ties, and the leading principles of pantheism were re- 
asserted. The great medical school of Padua, and 
the medical philosophy of the Arabian Averroes, were 
the chief sources of pantheism at this time, — after- 
wards more fully taught by Descartes and Spinosa. 

English deism flourished at the close of the sev- 
enteenth and the first half of the eighteenth century. 
It allowed the existence of a Deity, and of the re- 
ligion of the moral conscience, but denied a revela- 
tion. This system called forth a number of writers 
into the arena. Toland, Collins, Shaftesbury, Wool- 
ston, Bolingbroke, and Hume were its champions. 
These men assailed religion with coarseness and 


* Eece Deus. 


French Infidelity. 


■ 41 


bitter hostility, but lacked a real insight into the 
nature of the system which they opposed. They 
argued against atheism and pantheism as well as 
Christianity, and tried to reduce revealed religion to 
natural. Among the many answers to this school of 
infidels, Bishop Butler’s “Analogy” is perhaps the 
most complete. Probably no book since the times 
of the apostles has been so useful to the church in 
silencing unbelievers and solving the doubts of sin- 
cere minds. But the spread of infidelity was checked 
most of all by the extensive revival of spiritual re- 
ligion associated with the ministry of John Wesley 
and the Methodists. There are two causes for infi- 
delity, — the one intellectual, the other emotional. 
There are also two similar weapons against it. In- 
tellectual arguments may indeed serve the cause of 
truth ; but the story of Christ crucified, told in all 
simplicity, will awake an echo in the heart which 
neutralizes the doubts infused by the deist. Thus 
when the enemy came in like a flood, the Spirit of the 
Lord lifted up a standard against him. Bishop But- 
ler’s arguments for the head, and the spirit of revival 
for the heart, saved England and America to religion 
and civilization. 

French infidelity was an excessive reaction against 
the evils of despotism in church and state. Voltaire, 
Diderot, D’Alembert, D’Holbach, Rousseau, and 
others studied in the school of English deism, but 
carried their skepticism to greater lengths. Their 
criticism was shallow and gross and vulgar, and the 
effect of their writings upon public morals was la- 


42 


German Rationalism. 


mentable in the extreme. Not only did they destroy 
the feudalism which had outlived its age, but they 
also encouraged blank atheism and gross immorality. 
The results of infidelity in France will ever remain a 
warning to mankind. Not only was the monarchy 
overthrown, but religion was declared to be obsolete. 
The churches were stripped, the images of the Sa- 
viour were trampled under foot, and a fete was held in 
November, 1793, in which an opera-dancer was made 
to impersonate the goddess of Reason, introduced 
to the National Convention, led as a deity to the ca- 
thedral, and received adoration from the audience. 
The churches were closed, the Sabbath was abolished, 
and on all the public cemeteries was placed the in- 
scription, “ Death is an eternal sleep.” Then followed 
a scene of most atrocious murders, robberies, and 
licentiousness, which made France appear as if given 
over to a carnival of fiends. Thomas Paine’s “Age 
of Reason” was the direct outgrowth of French infi- 
delity, which also gave rise to the skepticism of Gib- 
bon, Shelley, Owen, and Byron. 

German rationalism seems to have been a mixture 
of English deism and French atheism. Its origin is 
doubtless to be traced to the decay of vital piety in 
Germany and the dissoluteness of the universities. 
The upholders of this scheme assume certain general 
principles as true and consistent with reason, and re- 
ject or explain away everything which seems to them 
at variance with their assumed standard. This stand- 
ard is said to be the deductions of reason from a 
contemplation of the natural and moral order of 


Modern Infidelity. 


43 


things. As, however, these deductions vary accord- 
ing to the intellectual and moral standpoint of each 
observer, rationalism has no settled creed. It is a 
vague, undefined system, whose adherents have no 
agreement among themselves, save in the rejection of 
a supernatural revelation. Some of its writers, by 
their criticisms, have made valuable additions to 
Christian literature, while others are wholly skepti- 
cal, attributing the origin of the Bible history to im- 
posture or to mythical tradition. Most of the churches 
of Germany seem to have been occupied for a num- 
ber of years by ministers who had no genuine faith 
in Christianity, and maintained the scheme of rational- 
ism in order to secure the pecuniary profits of their 
profession. The circumstances surrounding the ad- 
herents of skepticism were never so favorable as 
during the prevalence of rationalism in Germany. In 
addition to a general declension of piety, they had on 
their side literary prestige, wealth, numbers, and state 
patronage, and they improved every means in their 
power to propagate their views. Philosophical sys- 
tems, commentaries, and works on biblical criticism, 
grammars, lexicons, lectures, sermons, tracts, and al- 
most every other possible means of communication, 
became vehicles of unbelief. The purpose of the 
German rationalists has, however, signally failed, and 
a powerful reaction in favor of evangelical religion 
has taken place. 

Rationalism, as maintained at present, does not 
coldly deny Christianity, like the English deists, nor 
flippantly denounce it as imposture, like the French 


44 


Infidelity 7io Novelty. 


infidels, but seeks, after its own fashion, to appreciate 
its beauties and its genius, and by means of specu- 
lative criticism to separate what it deems to be truth 
from its errors. It claims for the human intellect the 
power and the authority to judge what is proper and 
right to be revealed from heaven, or to spurn the 
claim of such a revelation. Its .real design is often 
hidden beneath a mask of Christian profession. It 
would substitute a metaphysical pantheism for re- 
vealed religion, while it retains the language of Scrip- 
ture, accommodated by means of hidden senses and 
special explanations to suit its own creed. Thus, 
with the most thorough rationalists, God means the 
soul of the universe; Christ is the ideal of humanity; 
the incarnation is the union of the higher and lower 
principles of human nature ; and the atonement is the 
reconciliation of those principles through struggle 
and suffering. Of course, to carry out this design, 
all that is miraculous in the Bible must be explained 
away. This they attempt to do by resolving such 
passages into accounts of unusual events mistaken 
for supernatural, or into a set of symbolical legends. 

From such elements has the infidelity of the present 
May been derived. Some of these elements, in the old 
or in a new dress, are to be found in every opposer 
of Bible truth. Some appear in scientific treatises ; 
others insinuate themselves into newspaper and mag- 
azine literature, as well as into history and poetry. 
Some found creeds, as that of spiritualism, so called. 
Some relate to Christian doctrines, and others to the 
criticism of the Scripture documents. It is mani- 


Heathenism the Root of Infidelity. 


45 


festly impossible to follow them through all the wind- 
ings, nor is it necessary, since every point has been 
fully answered. “ The oracular utterances of Emer- 
son are but a revival of Spinoza’s pantheism ; the ab- 
solute religion of Theodore Parker is but a rehash 
of the skepticism of the age of scholasticism ; and 
the difficulties of Colenso are the old objections of 
Bruno Bauer, long ago answered by Hengstenberg 
and other great German scholars.” * 

The infidel objections against Christianity and the 
Christian record, notwithstanding the assumptions of 
rationalism, have not been caused by the discovery 
of any scientific facts, the natural inference from 
which required a change or readjustment of doctrine, 
but are the manifestation of the antagonism of the 
old philosophic cosmogonies. The root of modern 
skepticism is not new philosophy, but old heathen- 
ism. Occasional criticisms of interpretation have in- 
deed been made on scientific grounds ; but these 
cannot militate against the truth of the history or 
doctrine. There are necessary and natural imperfec- 
tions attaching themselves to the language of one age 
when interpreted by others, which may tax our in- 
dustry to ascertain the real meaning of the record, 
but cannot overthrow our faith. Divine truth is com- 
municated in human language, but the value of the 
treasure is not depreciated by the earthen vessel 
which contains it. The effort and research necessary 
to understand the Scriptures are also in perfect accord 


Tullidge’s Triumphs of the Bible. 


46 


Philosophy of Bacon. 


ance with the general order of nature, which ordains 
that useful results shall follow patient labor. 

The theories and speculations of ancient times 
served but to mystify and confound the human intel- 
lect, and rendered it necessary to reorganize the 
methods of scientific research. This was fully pointed 
out by Bacon, who inaugurated that mode of induc- 
tion and experiment which has done so much to 
enlarge the boundaries of true science. As false 
science is a sort of intellectual idolatry, which pays 
to error the reverence due to truth, Bacon gives the 
name of idols to the causes which have retarded and 
vitiated science, as follows: I. Idols of the tribe, or 
prejudices common to all men. 2. Idols of the cave, 
or individual prejudices. 3. Idols of the forum, or 
the prejudices men reciprocally communicate to each 
other. 4. Idols of the theatre, or the prejudices 
springing from the ascendency of teachers and phi- 
losophers. From these causes he shows that there 
had arisen both a false contemplation of nature and 
a false method of demonstration, to the injury of real 
science. He then lays down the methods of obser- 
vation, classification, and induction which are neces- 
sary to be followed in order to promote true knowl- 
edge, and enumerates the various branches of science 
to which they are applicable. It may be that this 
philosophy makes too little account of deduction, 
and that its psychological principle of sensation has 
been pushed to excess by the materialistic school of 
the eighteenth century, represented by Helvetius and 
D’Holbach; yet it has been, notwithstanding, the turn- 


Philosophy of Bacon. 4/ 

ing-point of the human intellect from the confusion 
of ancient learning to the progress of the present. 

With respect to science, properly so called, as dis- 
tinguished from history and poesy, Bacon teaches 
that as there are waters which spring from the earth 
and others which descend from the skies, so there are 
sciences which man derives from the terrestrial world, 
and another science which comes from heaven by 
revelation. He declares that sacred and inspired the- 
ology is the sabbath of all our labors, — the divine 
day of repose and consummation to the intelligence. 
He is wise enough to teach that the stars of philoso- 
phy will not guide the vessel of human reason here, 
but that we must depend upon the divine needle for 
justly shaping the course. He shows that the use 
of human reason in matters of religion is confined to 
the explanation of mysteries and to deductions from 
them, and relates chiefly to the interpretation of Scrip- 
ture. He proves that our reason is no criterion of 
what God ought to require of us. He says, “ We 
are obliged to believe the word of God, though our 
reason be shocked at it. For if we should believe 
only such things jis are agreeable to our reason, we 
assent to the matter and not to the author, which is 
no more than we do to a suspected witness.”* 

While Bacon sought the renovation of science by 
sensational experience, Descartes sought it in intel- 
lectual, — the instinctive utterances of consciousness. 
A true philosophy may yet find a union of the two 


Advancement of Learning, Book IX. 


48 Modern Skeptical Tendencies. 

extremes of metaphysical thought. It is the chiel 
merit of Bacon, however, that he was not so much a 
creator of theories as a founder of methods. Had 
his followers been content to follow the path he so 
clearly pointed out, the parallelism between the teach- 
ings of religion and science would have been more 
generally acknowledged. Instead, however, of con- 
fining themselves to observation, classification, and 
induction, men of scientific and literary tendencies are 
frequently found inventing cosmogonies and univer- 
sal systems, in imitation of the ancient schools, and 
endeavoring to compel the facts of modern science 
into their service. They desire to become world- 
builders, without the scientific knowledge which ren- 
ders it possible to attain such an end. One chief 
reason of this is that the Baconian system brings us 
no nearer to a knowledge of the elementary princi- 
ples of things than we were before. It unfolds to us 
a multitude of facts and phenomena, and their rela- 
tions, but of the real nature of matter, and force, and 
life, and intelligence, we are as ignorant as ever. Hence 
the temptation to return to ancient speculations. 

The skeptical tendencies manifested among scien- 
tific men of the present day vary from positive dis- 
belief of the supernatural, generated by fixed belief in 
the stability of nature and impossibility of miraculous 
interference, to merely isolated objections suggested 
by some presumed or apparent conflict between the 
discoveries of natural science and the statements of 
Scripture. In some form or other, however, nearly 
every ancient theory has its modern representatives. 


Tendencies of Free Thought . 


49 


The tendency to atheism or materialism may be seen 
in the application of statistics for the discovery of the 
laws of civilization, as taught by Buckle and Mill, 
in opposition to human freedom or divine agency. 
Dualism is represented by some of those naturalists 
who write on the correlation of forces. Pantheism 
is taught by the theory of development by law, and, 
in a similar form to the classical heathenism of the 
Eclectic or Neoplatonic school, by the spiritualists. 
Even the Pyrrhonists may find a parallel in some of the 
German schools of metaphysics. 

Mr. Farrar considers the tendencies of free thought 
at present to be three in number: “One, arising from 
Positivism, a tendency to deny the possibility of rev- 
elation; a second, from an opposite philosophy, to 
deny its necessity; and a third, to accept it only in 
part. These are the three tendencies by which the 
world and the church of the coming generation are 
likely to be influenced. Our path in life will be in a 
world where they are operating; and we shall need 
to be armed with the whole armor of God. If we 
have in our personal history so investigated the evi- 
dences of our faith as to feel that we have a well- 
grounded hope, unassailable by these doubts, we may 
be thankful; if we have gone safely through the 
perilous test of a careful examination of them, some- 
times staggering, perhaps, in our faith, yet struggling 
after truth, in prayerful trust that the Lord would 
himself be our teacher, until we are now able to feel - 
tliat we have our faith grounded on a rock, — a faith 
which is the result of inquiry, n t of ignorance, — let 
5 


50 


Tendencies of Free Thought. 


us be still more thankful, and exemplify our thank- 
fulness by trying to assist the doubter with our 
tender sympathy, and to aid him in finding the truth 
and peace which Christ has given to us.”* 


* Critical History of Free Thought. 


CHAPTER III. 

THE RECORD OF FAITH. 


** God . . . spake in time past unto the fathers.” — S t. Paul. 


(50 


CONTENTS. 

Mankind not originally barbarous — Civilization of the Earliest Ages 
as taught in the Scriptures — Religious Views of the Patriarchs — 
How Men become degraded in Civilization and Religion — The 
Scriptural Account confirmed by the History of Astronomy and the 
Ruins of Nations — Geological Argument for the Antiquity of Man 
— Duke of Argyll’s “Primeval Man” reviewed — History and 
Literature of Greece and India confirmatory of Scripture — The 
Primitive Religious Faith not natural — If natural, would not in- 
validate Scripture — Religious Ideas neither innate, nor from Sen- 
sational Experience, nor from Psychological Investigations — No 
other conceivable Mode except Revelation — Answer Objections 
from the Interpretation of certain Passages of Scripture. 


( 52 ) 


CHAPTER III. 


THE RECORD OF FAITH. 

In our last chapter we stated that the religious 
opinions of patriarchal times gave a coloring to the 
views of all nations, and showed that the variations 
of infidelity were but modifications or republications 
of ancient heathen philosophies and cosmogonies. 
We now examine whether the scriptural account 
of the early faith of mankind is confirmed by history, 
and whence that faith originated. 

Infidel writers have so persistently labored to show 
that man began his career in a state of barbarism, 
if, indeed, he be anything more than “a walking 
vegetable, an improved zoophyte, or, at best, a civil- 
ized orang-outang,” and the sentiment that we are 
the greatest of all generations is so soothing to 
vanity, that it seems almost hazardous to obtrude 
an opposite opinion; yet Scripture and authentic 
history unite in testifying that the original character 
of mankind was one of intellectual dignity, that let- 
ters and arts were known in the earliest ages, and 
that the barbarism of nations was owing to nomadic 
habits or vicious pursuits. 

Christianity makes no claim to be a discovery of 
6 * ( 53 ) 


54 


Mankind not originally barbarous „ 


any new fundamental truth. It is rather a history 
of facts than a new creed or hypothesis. It pro- 
fesses to exhibit the full development of the early 
faith of mankind, by means of a divinely-appointed 
system of agencies, extending from the first revela- 
tions made to patriarchs, through the Jewish church 
and nation, until in the fullness of time the entire 
scheme was completed by the mission of Jesus Christ 
and the establishment of the Christian church. The 
Bible transmits to us the Divine promise made to our 
first parents, and its renewal, from time to time, by 
special revelations, which Christianity asserts to have 
been fulfilled by the advent and death of Christ. We 
find also in the Scriptures, as collateral to its great 
design, an account of the religious opinions of the 
ancient world given by revelation, and of remark- 
able interpositions of Providence in the world’s 
history. 

Mankind is represented in those early days not in 
a wild and barbarous condition, with merely ele- 
mentary notions of language and arts and civiliza- 
tion, but as having obtained in some manner a high 
degree of knowledge and refinement. 

The knowledge of useful metals and dominion 
over the animal creation have always been con- 
sidered marks of civilization ; yet Abel kept sheep, 
and Jabal was the head of a noted tribe of cattle- 
breeders. Cain built a city called Enoch; and music 
and mechanical arts were known before the flood. 
Astronomy was cultivated, and names were given to 
the stars. Thus we find Job referring to Arcturus, 


Early Civilization. 


55 


Orion, and the Pleiades.* He also declares that God 
“stretcheth out the north over the empty place, and 
hangeth the earth upon nothing.”-)* The fine arts, as 
music and poetry, were cultivated, as is evident from 
the passage, “They take the timbrel and harp, and 
rejoice at the sound of the organ.”! Weaving and 
building and working in metals were well-known 
employments; hence the references, “My days are 
swifter than a weaver’s shuttle.”§ “Surely there is 
a vein for the silver, and a place for the gold where 
they fine it. Iron is taken out of the earth, and brass 
is molten out of the stone.”|| War had its imple- 
ments, commerce its ships and caravans, and luxury 
its ornaments of gold and silver and precious stones. 
Job refers to the iron weapon, the bow of steel, and 
the sword, Tf as well as to pieces of money and ear- 
rings of gold.** Abraham also “weighed to Ephron 
the silver which he had named in the audience of the 
sons of Heth, four hundred shekels of silver, current 
money with the merchant.”*)*! There was also a 
permanent literature, since language had books, and 
inscriptions, and laws of versification. It is thought 
by some good critics that the first part of the book 
of Genesis embodies more than one ancient docu- 
ment earlier than Moses. Certain it is that the song 
of Lamech, in antediluvian times, presents the prin- 
ciple of parallelism which is the form of Hebrew 


* Job, ix. 9; xxxviii. 3 1, 32. 
J Job, xxi. 12. 

|| Job, xxviii. I, 2. 

** Jol , xlii. 11. 


f Job, xxvi. 7. 

\ Job, vii. 6. 

H Job, xx. 24. 
ff Gen. xxiii. 16. 


56 Religions Views of the Patriarchs . 

verse.* God commanded Moses to write in a book 
for a memorial ;f and the names on Aaron’s breast- 
plate and mitre were engraved “ like the^engravings 
of a signet.”J Job exclaimed, “ Oh that my words 
were now written! oh that they were printed in 
a book! that they were graven with an iron pen 
and lead in the rock forever !”§ These representa- 
tions are not pictures of a barbarous age. Compared 
with Oriental nations of the present day, it would 
not seem that progress is an inherent quality of 
human nature. 

The religious views of the most ancient times are 
represented in the Scriptures as embracing the per- 
sonality and greatness of God, the creation and prov- 
idential government of the world, the existence of 
good and evil angels, the fall and depravity of man- 
kind, the promise of forgiveness and restoration by 
the mediation of a Redeemer, the possibility of Di- 
vine communications to the human consciousness, 
the reality and perpetuity of a future state, and the 
Divine sanction of moral laws and precepts. The 
moral laws which were regarded as of Divine au- 
thority in the patriarchal age, and which are called 
by ancient Jewish commentators “the statutes of 
Adam,” or “the precepts of the sons of Noah,” have 
been thus enumerated: 

1. To abstain from idolatry. 

2. To worship the true God. 


* Gen. iv. 23. 

J Ex xxviii. 21. 


f Ex. xvii. 14. 
\ Job, xix. 23. 


Development of Early Faith. 


5 7 


3. To commit no murder. 

4. To refrain from all impure lusts. 

5. To avoid all rapine, theft, and robbery. 

6. To administer true justice. 

7. To observe the Sabbath as a day of rest and 
worship. 

These things are clearly taught in the oldest books 
of Scripture, as the Pentateuch and the book of Job, 
and are there referred to as of most ancient date.* 
These great fundamental truths of religious history 
and doctrine the Bible records also as divinely re- 
vealed: “God hath spoken by the mouth of all his 
holy prophets since the world began. ”f In the 
Hebrew nation they were preserved and developed 
by a national polity, a religious priesthood and ritual, 
and a succession of inspired men and inspired writ- 
ings, which served as “ a light that shineth in a dark 
place until the day dawn.” The Christian dispensa- 
tion is the fulfillment of the ancient promises, the full 
development of ancient doctrines, and the exhibition 
of the full application of ancient precepts. 

If these representations of Scripture are true, they 
ought to be capable of historic confirmation by trac- 
ing backwards the religious thought of various na- 
tions, as so many radii proceeding from a common 
centre. The want of perfect records, however, renders 
such an investigation incomplete and fragmentary; 
yet it will not be unsuccessful. Ancient literature, and 
the progress of antiquarian research, especially in 


See Smith’s Patriarchal Age. 


-j- Acts, iii. 21. 


58 Hoiv Faith may be perverted or lost. 

Oriental lands, confirm the opinion that the lines 
drawn by history, though broken and effaced at many 
points, are perfectly parallel with the scriptural 
record. 

The manner in which religious ideas may become 
degraded, perverted, or lost is easy to trace. When a 
system of doctrines, or opinions, or historical events 
has been committed to writing, as in the Scriptures, 
it will, of course, be long preserved in its pure and 
simple form; but its traditional form will vary ac- 
cording to the habits and mental improvement of the 
people among whom it may be found. Among com- 
paratively civilized people, who congregate in cities 
and cultivate the arts and amenities of social life, its 
fundamental principles will remain longest, and its 
corruptions will be the product of philosophic specu- 
lation or poetic fancy. Among pastoral and agri- 
cultural nations we may expect to find, mingled with 
the elementary ideas, vagaries of greater simplicity, 
tinged with childish superstitions. Nomadic and 
barbarous tribes, who in the pursuit of the mere 
necessaries of life have but little time for instruction, 
are those among whom in the lapse of ages such a 
system will lose its distinctive characters, and in some 
instances may be totally lost. The history of religious 
opinion in all ages shows this to have been the case 
with respect to the primitive religion of the patri- 
archs. While we meet with fragments of it and 
testimonies to it in nearly all nations, the literature 
of Greece and the religious systems of Asia afford 
the most numerous points of coincidence. A few 


Ancient Civilization confirmed by Astronomy. 59 

barbarous tribes have been found which seem to have 
retained no trace of the idea of a Supreme Being, or 
of religious worship. Mr. Locke refers to the Hot- 
tentots of Soldania, etc. as instances of this kind; and 
Mr. Moffat, after over twenty years’ residence among 
the Bechuanas of South Africa, tells the same thing 
of them. The Papuans of Australia and the Digger 
Indians of California may in all probability be placed 
in the same class. 

The representations of the Scriptures respecting 
the arts and literature and civilization of the early 
world are fully confirmed by the history of astron- 
omy and by the remains of the most ancient nations 
known to historical science. 

Bailly, the friend and correspondent of Voltaire, 
in his treatise on Oriental Astronomy, bears un- 
witting testimony to the biblical account. He ob- 
serves that he had “ found everywhere in the ancient 
world not only astronomical improvements, which 
imply a corresponding progress in science, but also 
civil institutions for chronology and the regulation 
of time, derived from one source, and identically the 
same; an entire and consistent system of music, 
whose two halves, separated by revolutions incident 
to human affairs, had been transported to the two 
extremities of the globe; a primitive measure, which 
still exists everywhere in Asia, by itself or in its 
component parts, and which was connected with a 
very ancient and accurate determination of the mag- 
nitude of the globe; one and the same legislation for 
the sciences, arts, and religion; the same system of 


60 Human Remains confirmatory. 

physics and theology; in fine, everywhere remaining 
traces of ignorance succeeding to light and science.” 
The accurate astronomical records which have come 
down to us from earliest times confirm the same 
view of the primitive age. It is not possible for 
ignorant barbarians to have been capable of the 
complex observations and calculations which these 
records imply. 

The ruins of Egypt, Phoenicia, Assyria, and Baby- 
lon, and the light thrown upon their history by the 
researches of Champollion, Botta, Layard, and Raw- 
linson, give a similar testimony and afford numerous 
illustrations of the manners and customs referred to 
in the Bible.* 

Finding no room for the theory of development in 
the remains of authentic history, skepticism has in- 
terrogated the earth’s crust, and the discovery of 
human remains near Abbeville, France, and in other 
places, and the ruins of lake-habitations about several 


* “ ‘ It is, indeed, one of the most remarkable facts in history,’ 
writes Dr. Layard, * that the records of an empire so renowned for 
its power and civilization should have been entirely lost; and that 
the site of a city, as eminent for its extent as its splendor, should for 
ages have been a matter of doubt ; it is not, perhaps, less curious that 
an accidental discovery should suddenly lead us to hope that these 
records may be recovered, and this site satisfactorily identified.’ It 
is more than curious : it is the wise Providence of Him who uncov- 
ered! secret things that, in our busy, speculative, superficial age, when 
men are questioning the truth of his revelation, and, wise in their own 
conceit, denying his moral government of the worlds He has framed, 
the earth should, as it were, give forth a voice, reveal the buried pal- 
aces of ancient days, and proclaim thereby a fresh attestation to the 
truths of sacred writ.” — Treasury of Bible Knowledge. 




Human Remains in the Rocks. 6 1 

of the Swiss lakes, have afforded grounds for much 
scientific speculation and conjecture. No conclusion, 
however, can be drawn from these remains incon- 
sistent with the view of a degradation of some races 
from a more highly civilized condition. Dana, in his 
“ Manual of Geology,” after Prestwich, remarks that 
“ the evidence, as it at present stands, does not neces- 
sitate the carrying of man back in past time, so much 
as the bringing forward of the extinct animals towards 
our own time.” At the time of the Abbeville dis- 
covery, a scientific commission was appointed to in- 
vestigate it; but the evidence of relative antiquity 
was very conflicting, and in some respects incompati- 
ble. A distinguished French geologist, M. de Beau- 
mont, gave it as his opinion that the gravel deposit 
of the locality did not belong to the diluvian age at 
all, but to the actual or modern period. This latter 
period includes a large variety of rocks, of mechani- 
cal, organic, chemical, and igneous origin, having 
great variety of structure, from the alluvium of river- 
beds to travertine and lava of immense thickness. 
Prof. Heer, of Zurich, also, from examinations of the 
plants found in the Swiss lake-dwellings, deduces 
their age at from 1000 to 2000 years B.c. 

The Duke of Argyll, in his “ Primeval Man,” re- 
views the discussion between Archbishop Whately 
and Sir J. Lubbock respecting the origin of civiliza- 
tion. He argues for a vast antiquity for the human 
race, although fully accepting the scriptural account 
of man’s primeval condition and degradation. He 
rejects every theory of chronology drawn from ex- 
6 


62 


Chronology of the Early World. 


isting versions of the Old Testament, — the Hebrew, 
the Samaritan, and the Septuagint, — since they vary 
from each other, not by years, but by centuries. He 
suggests that the early history of the Old Testament 
was intended to be merely the history of typical men 
and typical generations, and its intimations of secular 
interests were obscure and incidental. Its account of 
the dividing of the tribes is so condensed as to give 
the impression of long intervals. The first of the de- 
scendants of Noah whose personality is clear to us is 
associated with the fact of national growth. Abra- 
ham figures in the advanced civilization of the Pha- 
raohs in Egypt, and Chedorlaomer appears the sov- 
ereign of a long-established race. The migrations of 
Abraham stand at the very beginning of historical 
chronology. They give us the earliest date on which 
chronologists, without great discrepancy, are agreed. 
This is 2000 years b.c. Yet the Egyptian monarchy 
was founded long before, — some say 700 years before. 
This places the beginning of the Pharaohs at 2800 
b.c., which, according to Usher’s interpretation of the 
Hebrew Pentateuch, would be 400 years before the 
flood. The Septuagint varies from this 800 years, — 
a variation so enormous as to throw doubt on the 
whole system of interpretation by which such com- 
putations are made. The authentic records of the 
Chinese begin in the twenty-fourth century b.c., or 
300 years before Abraham, although some consider 
them less ancient. The Duke of Argyll thinks that 
such facts indicate either that the flood happened 
vastly earlier than has been usually supposed, or that 


Antiquity of the Human Race. 63 

it destroyed only a portion of the human family. The 
chronologies professedly founded on the Pentateuch 
he considers to involve doubtful and inconsistent in- 
terpretations. Thus, when we read of Canaan, the 
grandson of Noah, that he “ begat Sidon his first- 
born, and Heth,” we seem to have the names of in- 
dividual men ; but when it is immediately added that 
he also begat “ the Jebusite, and the Amorite, and the 
Arkite, and the Sinite,” etc., it is clear that we are 
dealing not with single generations, but with a con- 
densed abstract of the origin and growth of tribes. 
The varieties of the human race, also, which the 
science of language, as well as the Scriptures, shows 
to have descended from a common stock, require a 
vast antiquity to account for them, especially as there is 
proof from the Egyptian monuments of the existence 
of the negro race 1400 years b.c. He sums up the 
geological evidence as follows: 1st. That man ap- 
peared in Northern Europe at a time when it was 
covered with quadrupeds now wholly extinct. 2d. 
That the surface of the earth has since that period 
been subject to modifications which imply great 
changes in physical geography. 3d. That the period 
when these animals flourished and when man coex- 
isted with them was one when a colder climate pre- 
vailed. 

Argyll accepts the geological evidence for the great 
antiquity of the rude implements found in caves, etc., 
but considers it about as safe to argue from these im- 
plements as to the condition of man in his primeval 
home, as to argue from the habits and acts of the Es- 


64 The Cave-Bear and the Glaciers. 

quimaux the state of civilization in London or Paris. 
He refers to the language of archaeologists respecting 
a stone age, a bronze age, and an iron age, and de- 
clares that there is no proof that such ages ever ex- 
isted in the world, since flint implements are a very 
uncertain index of civilization even among the tribes 
who used them, and are no index at all of the civiliza- 
tion of cotemporaneous tribes. He fully indorses the 
theory of moral degradation, and says that “ human 
corruption in this sense is as much a fact in the natural 
history of man as that he is a biped without feathers.” 

Dr. Winchell replies to the skeptical argument 
that Geology requires a higher antiquity for the 
human race than the Scriptures teach, as follows : 
“ We have no rule for the measurement of post- 
Tertiary time which necessitates the admission of so 
high antiquity to our race. If we have been accus- 
tomed to think of the extinction of the cave-bear as 
dating back to high antiquity, we now discover that 
he lived with man and the reindeer, and other animals 
which still survive. The existence of even the cave- 
bear may not have been so very remote. What are 
the reasons assigned for the prevalent opinion that it 
was many ages ago that the glaciers began to dis- 
appear from Europe? Simply the existence at that 
time of quadrupeds now extinct, together with the 
presumption, unsupported, as it seems, by the facts, 
that no animals have coexisted with man except 
those of the recent fauna. The fact is that we come 
ourselves upon the earth in time to witness the retreat 
of the glaciers. They still linger in the valleys of the 


Beginnings of our Race. 65 

Alps and along the northern shores of Europe and 
Asia, while the disappearance of animals once con- 
temporaries of man is still continuing. Not only did 
contemporaries of man become extinct during the 
age of stone; some survived to the twelfth, fourteenth, 
and sixteenth centuries, as already stated; the moa 
of New Zealand and the aepiornis of Madagascar 
have become extinct within the epoch of tradition, as 
indeed has the mammoth of North America; the 
dodo of Mauritius disappeared in the seventeenth 
century; the great auk of the arctic regions has not 
been seen for half a century ; and every one must be 
convinced that the beaver, elk, panther, buffalo, and 
other quadrupeds of North America, are approaching 
extinction by perceptible steps. The fact is, we are 
not so far out of the dust and chaos and barbarism 
of antiquity as we had supposed. The very begin- 
nings of our race are still almost in sight. Geological 
events which, from the force of habit in considering 
geological events, we had imagined to be located far 
back in the history of things, are found to have trans- 
pired at our very doors. Our own race has witnessed 
the dissolution of those continental glaciers which we 
have so long talked of as incidents of pre-Adamite 
history. Our own race has witnessed the submer- 
gence of Southern Europe ; the detachment of the 
British Islands and Scandinavia from the continent ; 
the wanderings of the great rivers of Eastern Asia ; 
the submergence of thousands of square miles of the 
coast of China, so that the seats of ancient capitals are 
now rocky islets far at sea; the emergence of the 
6 * 


66 The Bible and Geology Harmonious. 

ancient country of Leetonia ; the drainage of the vast 
lake which once overspread the prairies of Illinois ; 
the alternations of forests; and many other events 
which we once associated with high antiquity. It is 
the opinion of Hooker and Gray that the Falkland 
Islands, and others in the vicinity, have formed a part 
of the continent of South America during recent times, 
and that during this connection they acquired the 
continental fauna and flora. The Straits of Behring 
may even have been cut through since the early 
migrations of man and his contemporaries, the mam- 
moth and reindeer, as in some distant future age the 
Isthmus of Darien, which now connects North and 
South America, may become a strait separating them. 
There is no more reason in this day than fifty years 
ago to claim a hundred thousand years for the past 
duration of our race.”* 

Dr. Dawson institutes comparisons between our 
present knowledge of palaeocosmic men as gained 
from Geology and the scriptural record. He shows 
that both the Bible and Geology exhibit man to be 
united without any break to the close of the (Ter- 
tiary) period of the great mammals ; that the oldest 
human remains are nearly allied to the most widely- 
distributed modern race, while their size and strength 
remind us of the nephilirn or giants of Scripture ; 
that the cranial capacity of these earliest men shows 
no sign of affinity with brutes ; that the condition, 
habits, and structure of palaeocosmic men correspond 


* Sketches of Creation, p. 368. 




Argument of Prof Lewis. 67 

with the idea that they may be rude and barbarous 
offshoots of more cultivated tribes ; and that their 
funeral rites and the traces of their religious beliefs 
point to a similarity with those of the most ancient 
races of men, which are all fairly traceable to corrup- 
tions of those primitive articles of faith revealed in the 
Scriptures.* 

Prof. Tayler Lewis [Excursus in Lange’s Genesis, 
ch. x.] argues that the admission of a creation does 
not demand the idea of an instantaneous coming 
from nothing of everything belonging to the new 
existence, but only the new and distinct beginning 
of that which especially makes it what it is — a new, 
peculiar entity separate from everything else. Ap- 
plying this to man, his origin may have been as 
remote as any theory may allow. Even the common 
idea of an outward plastic formation of the body 
implies the use of a previous nature in previous 
materials, and is essentially the same idea as that of 
the employment of previous growths and processes. 
How many steps there were we cannot know, but 
there may have been outwardly approximations to 
the human long before there was reached that 
humanity proper in which nature and spirit unite. 
We need not be startled at the thought of such 
anthropoidal forms, some, perhaps, larger than any 
now found on earth, and which may have perished, 
like some of the mammoth mammalia. If the ex- 
plorations of science have brought to light any such 


* Nature and the Bible, p. 176. 


68 


The Tme Humanity. 


remains, our faith need not be disturbed by the ques- 
tion of their pre-historicalness. The interpreter of 
Scripture is little concerned either in affirming or 
denying such discoveries. Whatever be their date, 
we have not yet come to the humanity proper, the 
Adamic humanity, that humanity which Christ as- 
sumed and raises to a still higher sphere. The true 
creation of man was not merely a formation or an 
animation , but an inspiration — a direct, divine inspira- 
tion (Gen. ii. 7) ; and now there is what before was 
not, a new thing upon earth, not simply something 
higher physically (though even that would require a 
divine intervention), but an entity distinct as con- 
nected with a higher or supernatural world. 

From this primus homo , thus inspired, comes all 
of humankind. This inspiration is a new divine 
force in the earth. The fall does not at once destroy 
it, though giving a tendency to spiritual death, carry- 
ing with it a physical decline. Even with this, how- 
ever, the primitive divine impulse in the first men 
makes them very different from what is now called 
the savage state, which is everywhere found to be 
the dregs of a once higher condition, the setting in- 
stead of the rising sun. All past and present history 
may be confidently challenged to present the con- 
trary. Among human tribes, wholly left to them- 
selves, the higher man never comes out of the low~er. 

In the antediluvian period the creative impulse 
manifested itself by its resistance to the death-prin- 
ciple, which the fall through the spiritual had intro- 
duced into the physical organization of man. After 


Confirmation by Secular History. 


69 


the flood this impulse tended to a sensual gregari- 
ousness, making humanity sublime even in its wick- 
edness. It was the time of the tower-builders, the 
pyramid-builders, the great city-builders, the empire- 
founders. It was different from anything now known 
in savage tribes, and produced results utterly un- 
known as ever following from such a state. 

Such were the primitive men as the Bible presents 
them to us, although their mere worldly greatness 
was to the Scripture writers a wholly subordinate 
subject. Secular history confirms the account: 1 st, 
by its silence as to all before. At most, only a few 
bones, here and there discovered, and about whose 
real antiquity men of science are still contending, 
are all the traces of man’s existence in pre-historic 
times. We ask in vain for marks of progress, or of 
any transition state. A speaking silence, like that 
which seems to come from the blank chamber of the 
Great Pyramid, proclaims that man, the Adamic or 
Noachic man, is not much older than the pyramids. 
History confirms this, 2dly, by its positive testimony. 
It begins with men doing great things, raising pyra- 
mids, building cities, founding states. It opens with 
the Egyptian and Babylonian empires, and that, too, 
as new powers in fullest vigor and presenting every 
appearance of youthful greatness. In brief, the first 
historical appearances of men upon the earth are at 
war with the theory of savagism. The savage condi- 
tion is one ever sinking lower until aid is brought to 
it from without, and at the early time referred to there 
was no such aid except from a supernatural source. 


;o 


History of Greece Confirmatory. 

The early history of Greece is shrouded in ob- 
scurity ; but we deduce from the most reliable sources 
that about the time of the removal of the family of 
Jacob into Egypt a barbarous horde from Asia Minor 
migrated to the islands and coasts opposite. Other 
colonies from Egypt and Phoenicia followed, carrying 
with them their various arts and policies. Maritime 
and piratical expeditions brought them into contact 
with other parts of the world and served to elevate 
them into a state of semi-civilization. As time wore 
on, their manners became more refined, their language 
more perfect, and a succession of great and wise men 
exalted Greece to the position of the most learned 
and polished nation of ancient times. Its institutions 
and literature became the wonder and the model of 
the world. The first colonizers of Greece brought 
with them such principles as they retained of the sim- 
ple faith and worship of the patriarchs ; but as in all 
other countries except the land of Israel, so here this 
faith became corrupted by vain imaginations, and a 
degrading polytheism was substituted for the primi- 
tive worship ; yet in no other nation than Greece do 
we witness such struggles of the human mind to re- 
turn to elementary truth by means of reason and 
philosophy. 

Plato declares that “ after a certain flood, which but 
few escaped, on the increase of mankind they had 
neither letters, writing, nor laws, but obeyed the man- 
ners and institutions of their fathers as laws; but 
when colonies separated from them they took an 
elder for their leader, and in their new settlements 




Patriarchal Ideas in Greece. 71 

retained the customs of their ancestors, — those es- 
pecially which related to their gods,— and thus trans- 
mitted them to their posterity. They imprinted them 
on the minds of their sons, and they did the same to 
their children. This was the origin of right laws and 
of the different forms of government.”* 

Herodotus states that at Dodona he was told that 
they had formerly sacrificed and prayed to the Deity 
in general, without giving any name or names to the 
object of their worship, but that, after a long time, the 
names of the gods were brought there from Egypt. 

The resemblance of the religious ideas of the Greeks 
to those of the early history of the Bible may be seen, 
notwithstanding many imaginations and speculations, 
in the theories of philosophers and in the poetic and 
historic literature of Greece" yet extant. A volume 
of quotations might be made in confirmation of this 
view. The existence and worship of God, the sep- 
arate state of the soul after death, and its reward or 
punishment in Elysium or Tartarus, the doctrine of 
sacrificial mediation, the difference between virtue and 
vice, the primitive chaos, the golden age, the fall of 
mankind, the tendency of the world to moral corrup- 
tion, the deluge, and the doctrine of special interpo- 
sitions of Heaven, — all these primitive ideas were 
retained with more or less distinctness in all their 
idolatries and speculations and poetic fancies. 

The religious thought of India, and of the greater 
part of the Oriental nations, has been greatly modi- 


Plato, De Leg., iii. p. 680, 


72 


Origin of Religious Ideas. 


fied by the theories of a philosophic pantheism, the 
peculiar character of which seems to have been the 
origin of Grecian, if not of all philosophic, specula- 
tion. The more luxuriant imagination of the East, 
also, has produced a greater variety of fabulous 
legends and idolatries than elsewhere. Yet amid all 
this it is not difficult to find the substratum of religious 
truth, corresponding to that of the primitive age as 
given in the Scriptures. The ideas of Divine exist- 
ence, of the nature of virtue and vice, of a future 
state of rewards and punishments, and of sacrificial 
mediation for the forgiveness of sin, may be clearly 
traced through all the fables and vagaries with which 
they are accompanied. 

Similar things may be said of every nation of which 
we have any authentic accounts. “ Everywhere/’ 
says Humboldt, “ the traces of a common origin, the 
opinions concerning cosmogony, and the primitive 
traditions of nations, present a striking analogy even 
in minute circumstances. Does not the humming- 
bird of Tezpi call to mind the dove of Noah, that of 
Deucalion, and the birds, according to Berosus, which 
Xisutrus sent forth from the ark, to try if the waters 
had subsided, and if as yet he could erect altars to 
the gods of Chaldea?”* 

Whatever religious ideas may be culled out of the 
opinions or practice of any nation which find a par- 
allel in the ideas of others, have their primitive root 
and groundwork in the Bible, divested of speculative 


* Humboldt’s Cosmos. 


Religious Faith not natural. 73 

and superstitious imaginations. The Bible records 
these ideas in their purest and simplest form. This 
of itself is a strong presumptive argument for its truth 
as a faithful history of the primitive and catholic faith 
of mankind. “Which of your poets,” observes Ter- 
tullian, “which of your sophists, have not drunk from 
the fountain of the prophets ? It is from these sacred 
sources, likewise, that your philosophers have re- 
freshed their thirsty spirits, and if they found any- 
thing in the Holy Scriptures to please their fancy or 
to serve their hypotheses, they turned it to their own 
purpose, and made it serve their curiosity, not con- 
sidering these writings to be sacred and unalterable, 
nor understanding their sense, — every one taking or 
leaving, adopting or remodeling, as his imagination 
led him.” 

Having traced the streams of religious opinion 
backwards to their common fountain in the patriarchal 
age as exhibited to us in the Bible, the question nat- 
urally arises, Whence these ideas? Are they natural 
to mankind ? Are they the product of nature or 
reason, or have they been communicated by Divine 
revelation ? 

If religious faith is natural, or is the product of 
either nature or reason, it would be fair to presume 
that it would be equally clear and distinct in every 
age and nation of the world, since the gifts of nature 
and of reason are so largely distributed. We have 
seen, however, that this is not the case. The tendency 
of mankind, as shown by history, is to corrupt re- 
ligious truth ; and if the authorities referred to can be 
7 


74 The Bible tme , if Faith natural. 

relied upon, some tribes have lost all knowledge of 
it whatever. It is only as we ascend towards the 
fountain that the stream becomes pure and whole- 
some. Again, one item of primitive faith, — the prom- 
ise of forgiveness of sin through a Redeemer, — tes- 
tified to by all the sacrifices of the heathen world, is 
essentially germinal in its nature ; it points to a com- 
ing Saviour, — ‘'the desire of all nations.” If this 
faith be natural, how does it happen that it has never 
been developed, save in Israel and in the cross of our 
Lord Jesus Christ? The Avatars of India and other 
mythologies may have parodied this doctrine, but it 
has never been historically developed except as re- 
corded in the Christian Scriptures. It is literally true 
that “ other foundation can no man lay than that is 
laid,” and “ there is none other name under heaven 
given among men by which we must be saved.” If 
the Scriptures are rejected, this hope of the ancient 
world must be regarded as vain or unaccomplished. 
In such a case the questions would still recur, Whence 
this faith ? If of natural origin, w r hy not its develop- 
ment also ? 

If we were to admit that the patriarchal faith was 
natural to mankind, it would not necessarily militate 
against the truth and inspiration of the Scriptures. 
They might still be regarded as a republication of 
natural religion, made by Divine authority, with ad- 
ditional sanctions, more clearly established and de- 
veloped by providential interposition into a complete 
system for human redemption and the conduct of 
life. Some such view seems to have been taken by 


75 


Innate Ideas no Source of Faith. 

many theologians and writers who have referred to 
moral notions among the heathen as “ the light of 
nature,” and have considered such natural ideas suf- 
ficient to teach the difference between good and evil 
and to lead to the performance of religious duties. 
Some of these writers have been very inconsistent 
with their own views respecting the necessity of a 
revelation. 

Religious ideas can only be natural to man in one 
of two ways, — they must either be innate, or acquired 
by sensational or psychological experience. If we 
find on examination that they could have been ob- 
tained in neither of these modes, we shall be obliged 
to acknowledge that they have originated in Divine 
revelation. Metaphysicians have written largely upon 
these subjects, but none of them, either of the sen- 
sational or idealistic schools of philosophy, have ever 
succeeded in proving that the religious faith of man- 
kind is either innate or acquired from nature. We 
therefore conclude with Bacon “ that sacred theology 
must be drawn from the word and oracles of God, 
not from the light of nature or the dictates of rea- 
son.”* 

There can be no reasonable doubt that we have 
certain inborn (innate) natural faculties by which we 
are enabled to “ discern the agreement or disagree- 
ment of some notions so soon as we have the notions 
themselves ; as that we can or do think, that therefore 
we ourselves are, that one and two make three, etc. 


* Advancement of Learning, Book IX. 


76 


Religion not innate . 


This we may call intuitive knowledge, or natural cer- 
tainty wrought into our very make and constitution.”* 
Such knowledge, however, as insisted on by Kant and 
others, is always marked by necessity and universality. 
Mr. Lockef argues against the theory of innate ideas, 
declaring that there are none to which men give a 
universal consent. Which side soever we assume in 
respect to the general principles of knowledge, the 
arguments of Mr. Locke will fully apply to every item 
of the patriarchal faith. He first shows that if there 
were certain truths wherein all mankind agreed, it 
would not prove them innate, if any other way can be 
shown how they obtained them. He then argues that 
there are no ideas so universal, for if children and 
idiots have no apprehension of them it destroys that 
universal consent which is the necessary concomitant 
of all innate truths. Further, such general maxims 
ought to appear clearest and brightest in those per- 
sons in whom we find them not, as in children and 
illiterate persons, who are least corrupted by custom 
or borrowed opinions. 

We have already seen that there are whole tribes 
of men who are so degraded as to have lost most, if 
not all, of the knowledge of God and of religious truth. 
The observations, also, of those who have had the 
care of deaf mutes — as in the interesting case of Laura 
Bridgman, who was born deaf, dumb, and blind, but 
was instructed through the sense of touch until she 


* Oldfield, Essay on Reason, p. 5. 

■j- Essay on the Human Understanding. 


Religious Ideas not from the Senses. 


77 


could hold conversation, and who testified that she 
had no knowledge or idea of God or the soul until 
she was taught — tend to confirm the view that there 
are no innate religious ideas. Archbishop Whately 
pertinently remarks that “ a deaf-mute, before he has 
been taught a language, — either the finger-language 
or reading, — cannot carry on a train of reasoning, any 
more than a brute. He, indeed, differs from a brute 
in possessing the mental capability of employing lan- 
guage ; but he can no more make use of that capa- 
bility till he is in possession of some system of 
arbitrary general signs, than a person born blind from 
cataract can make use of his capacity for seeing till 
the cataract is removed. Hence it will be found by 
any one who will question a deaf-mute who has been 
taught language after having grown up, that no 
such thing as a train of reasoning had ever passed 
through his mind before he was taught.”* If reli- 
gious ideas were inborn or arose spontaneously in 
the mind, such persons would manifest their pos- 
session when they were brought into contact with 
other minds, and had been taught to exercise their 
Acuity of expression. 

As we can find no reason to believe the primitive 
faith to be innate to mankind, there is likewise no 
evidence that it could have originated from sensa- 
tional experience. The ideas of God, of spirit, of 
moral duty, of sin, and of atonement, which lie at 
the basis of the patriarchal religion, are spiritual 


* Elements of Logic, p. 21. 


78 Knowledge dependent upon Sensation. 

ideas, i.e. they relate to the existence and nature and 
condition of spiritual beings ; while external nature 
is only competent to communicate ideas of material 
things. The mind has no connection with the ex- 
ternal world except by means of the nervous system 
of the body, and every simple idea communicable by 
means of the nerves, as ideas of seeing, hearing, feel- 
ing, smelling, and tast’ng, must in the nature of things 
relate to the properties of matter. It is impossible to 
conceive that one could see, hear, feel, smell, or taste 
anything immaterial. “As it is written, Eye hath not 
seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the 
heart of man, the things which God hath prepared 
for them that love him. But God hath revealed them 
unto us by his Spirit.”* The manner in which super- 
natural communications of spiritual ideas may be re- 
vealed in the sphere of the natural world is a subject 
for subsequent consideration. In denying a material 
origin for faith, we do not underrate sensation as a 
means of acquiring knowledge. We are doubtless 
dependent upon it for our perceptions of the external 
world. So important and fundamental is it that many 
have conceived it to be the only means of gaining 
knowledge, and teach that every idea in our minds 
may be traced to our senses ; but, as the stream can- 
not rise higher than its source, it is evident that sen- 
sation can communicate no knowledge of anything 
beyond its own origin in the material world. 

The only remaining mode by which ideas may be 


* i Cor. ii. 9, io. 


Faith not from Mental Faculties. 


79 


naturally obtained is by psychological experience, 
or the observation and application of the mental 
faculties. 

Whatever importance we may assign to the senses 
with relation to our knowledge of external things, it 
is easily seen that no man “ knoweth the things of a 
man, save the spirit of man which is in him.” Con- 
sciousness is a faculty or power of the mind by which 
a man knows himself to be himself, and to be the 
subject of the various sensations he experiences. The 
Creator, also, has obviously established a close rela- 
tion between the mind and outward things, and the 
power of tracing relations among the various objects 
of thought is a faculty of which the mind is conscious. 
The ideas derived from this source, called by Mr. 
Locke ideas of reflection, have much to do with the 
extent and accuracy of our knowledge of the ex- 
ternal world; but the knowledge of “the things of a 
man,” or those faculties which distinguish us from 
other creatures, depends entirely upon them. 

From the time of the first publication of the Pla- 
tonic philosophy, the various schools of metaphysi- 
cians, in all ages, have examined this subject in order 
to discover what may be known by observing or con- 
centrating the mind’s inherent powers; but thus far 
no one has been able to point out how the primitive 
and universal religious faith of mankind could have 
originated in this manner. St. Paul declared that 
“the world by wisdom knew not God,” and the most 
thorough investigation fully confirms the sentiment. 
Kant, who may be called the apostle of transcenden- 


So 


Reason ignorant of God. 


talism, or supersensuous philosophy, treats largely 
upon this subject, and denies the possibility of prov- 
ing the existence of a Deity on the grounds of spec- 
ulative reason. He discusses the three kinds of argu- 
ment which he declares to be the only modes possible, 
and which he terms the ontological argument, deduced 
from a priori conceptions alone ; the cosmological ar- 
gument, “ from a purely indeterminate experience, 
that is, some empirical existence ;” and the physico- 
theological argument, beginning “ from determinate ex- 
perience and the peculiar constitution of the world of 
sense, and rising, according to the laws of causality', 
from it to the highest cause existing apart from the 
world.” He declares “ that all attempts of reason to 
establish a theology by the aid of speculation alone 
are fruitless, that the principles of reason as applied 
to nature do not conduct us to any theological truths, 
.*n d, consequently, that a rational theology can have 
no existence unless it is founded upon the laws of 
morality.” Again, “ A supreme being is, therefore, 
for the speculative reason, a mere ideal, though a 
faultless one, — a conception which perfects and crowns 
the system of human cognition, but the objective 
reality of which can neither be proved nor disproved 
by pure reason.”* 

From such considerations we are obliged to ques- 
tion the human origin or natural foundation of reli- 
gion, and are compelled to differ from those theolo- 
gians who regard the Scriptures as a republication of 


Critique of Pure Reason. 


Light of Early Revelation. 81 

the truths of nature. We are forced to the conclusion 
that the existence and prevalence of ideas pertaining 
to the spiritual world, as ideas of God, spirit, duty, 
sin, atonement, etc., prove that there has been a rev- 
elation made to man from the world of spirits, since 
no other mode of acquiring such ideas is conceivable. 
The spiritual or religious faculties of man have not 
been left without appropriate objects, any more than 
the intellect or the bodily nature. We have seen, also, 
that the root and substratum of all the primitive reli- 
gious ideas in the world are contained in the Bible, 
unconnected with speculative follies or degrading 
superstitions. We therefore regard the Bible as the 
genuine and original record of Divine revelation. 

This view of the origin of religious truth agrees 
with all the annals of antiquity. “ Moses has recorded 
the settlements of the first parents of mankind, where 
God, in a more frequent and immediate manner, gave 
revelations of his will, and commanded them to teach 
it to their children and their children’s children. 
Hence those first colonies of the East, Phoenicia, 
Persia, and Egypt, continued the oracles of learning 
to the world through all succeeding ages. The 
further men dispersed from them, the more they 
became sunk in barbarity and divested of humanity 
Reason was like the echo: where nearest to the voice 
it was strong, but as it removed, gradually sunk and 
died away. And what not a little contributed to this 
preservation of knowledge in the East was God's con- 
tinuing to reveal himself to the Jews, so that in pro- 
cess of time the little spot of Jewry was the only 


82 Law written in the Hearts of the Heathen . 

place where the true God was known and taught. 
And some beams of this Divine wisdom could not 
but shine forth from time to time upon the neighbor- 
ing people who conversed with them. Accordingly, 
whenever we find a people begin to revive in litera- 
ture, it was owing to one of these causes : either to 
some transmigrators from those parts coming and 
settling among them, or else to their going thither 
for instruction. From these fountains they always 
had it, and at this fire the nations of the world lighted 
their own. There is no instance to the contrary. 
Hither Athens, and afterwards Rome, came in quest 
of knowledge and instruction. These were the schools 
and masters to the world. And, though our accounts 
of Asia are but short and defective, yet what remains 
there are, as also their traditions, even in China, trace 
their origin and oracles westward ; which is the fullest 
confirmation of the Mosaic history, and of the propa- 
gation of knowledge by instruction only.”* 

It is sometimes objected that certain texts of Scrip- 
ture encourage the idea of the natural origin of 
religious truth. Thus, in Rom. ii. 15, St. Paul men- 
tions the law written in the hearts of men, even 
heathens, and implies that the principles of moral law 
are innate in man. To this the author last quoted 
replies, “ That a principal distinction between the 
Jews and Gentiles was that one had a written law, the 
other not ; that, before the age of Moses, the whole 
world was subject to the same general law, as it had 


Ellis’s Knowledge of Divine Things from Revelation. 


«3 


The Law of God binding on all. 

been given to Adam, Noah, etc. from God, and by 
them delivered to their posterity, who were subject to 
the sanctions of it in rewards and punishments ; which 
in justice they could not have been, except it had the 
force of a law, and received sufficient promulgation. 
Thus the patriarchs were justified in obeying, the 
Sodomites and others condemned for disobeying the 
law delivered to them; and after-ages had these gen- 
eral notions of duty and sin providentially continued 
down to them, to keep conscience and the inward 
senses of the soul awake, and thereby render them 
excusable or inexcusable. And all the ancient com- 
mentators understood these words, orav yap k'Ovrj, ‘ for 
when the Gentiles/ etc., Rom. ii. 14, of those who 
lived before the law, as Melchisedec, Job, etc., or who 
repented, as the Ninevites, or who had learned the 
worship of the true God, as Cornelius. This was 
their vopuq aypa<p<> c, unwritten law, for the heathen 
world had no other. Draco’s were the first (and those 
chiefly political ones) committed to writing in Greece, 
about 624 years before Christ ; and a moral system 
was not attempted till Socrates taught it, and Xeno- 
phon and Plato recorded his sentiments. 

“Again, the wisest writers on the law of nature (as 
Puffendorf) interpret these texts as a figurative ex- 
pression, and implying no more than a clear and cer- 
tain knowledge treasured up in the memory, of which 
the persons spoken of are convicted in their own con- 
sciences, by what means soever these notions entered 
into their thoughts. And to write in the mind iv tt} 
yv/f ypd<pecv f et scribere in animo , was a phrase in com- 


84 God seen from the Creation. 

mon use with the Greeks and Latins as well as the 
holy penmen both of the Old and New Testaments.” 

Another text is sometimes quoted to show that the 
being and attributes of God may be discovered in the 
works of nature: “For the invisible things of him 
from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being 
understood by the things that are made, even his 
eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without 
excuse.” Rom. i. 20. But the context shows that 
the apostle is so far from asserting the sufficiency of 
nature to discover the existence of a Deity, that his 
argument is founded on the heathens being already 
convinced of this truth. The following comments 
are judicious and conclusive: 

Dr. Ellis remarks, v. 19, “ Because that which may 
be known of God” — as much as was necessary for 
their present circumstances, concerning his essence, 
attributes, and will — “is manifest in them,” or (as the 
margin and others read it) to them, or among them, 
not indeed from nature and reason, “for God hath 
showed it unto them,” lyavipwes: the word expressly 
denotes a positive act of God, who brought to light, 
made manifest and evident, that which was dark, ob- 
scure, and unknown before, by the sundry ways He 
thought proper to reveal and make himself known 
to us. 

V. 20, “ For (r*p, nam , siqnidem, forasmuch as) the 
invisible things of Him” — “ his eternal power and God- 
head,” as afterwards explained — “ from (not but «-<), 
ever since) the creation of the world,” when they were 
fully communicated, “ are clearly seen,” because, after 


Religion as Old as the World. 85 

a declaration of his nature and existence, the Divine 
attributes are plainly evinced, “ being understood" 
[vooop.sva f explained to the understanding) “ by the 
things that are made” (izoty;ia<n) t the works of God, or 
things which He had done ; not only of creation but 
of providence, in the deluge, in the wonderful preser- 
vation of his church and destruction of his enemies, 
in his many appearances, miracles, and interpositions 
with mankind, which through all ages had been re- 
lated to them, and were a sensible demonstration of 
omniscience, omnipotence, invisibility, and immateri- 
ality : “ even his eternal power and Godhead,” which 
alone could effect such wonderful things. 

On the phrase “from the creation,” Matthew Henry 
says, “Understand either the work of creation as a 
topic, and man in particular, — or, the date of the dis- 
covery, as old as the creation of the world.” 

Koppe says, “ From the (i.e. from the period of thel 
very creation of the world.” 

Rev. R. Watson, in his exposition of this passage, 
says, “ It by no means follows from this that the 
apostle intended to teach that the principles of God’s 
moral government, his will, and our duties and hopes, 
in a word, all that has been termed natural religion, 
is to be learned by the study of physics, and that the 
visible world is a sufficient book for man. The 
apostle well knew that both among Gentiles and 
Jews, from the earliest ages, there had been commu- 
nications of moral truth in direct revelations, and 
traditions of those revelations ; that the world had 
never been without moral laws, or without promises 
8 


86 Religion as Old as the World. 

of redemption ; and what he knew to be fact, univer- 
sally acknowledged by those to whom he writes, he 
assumes ; and considers, therefore, that what proves 
the existence of that God, made known as to his will 
and designs in these early and widely-diffused reve- 
lations, gave authority also to all the truth which had 
ever been connected with the doctrine. He assumes, 
in fact, what we see assumed throughout the Scrip- 
tures, that God communicated the knowledge of 
himself and his will originally to mankind; that this 
knowledge, though disregarded and darkened, was 
never wholly lost; that the visible universe was a 
standing testimony to it as existing, not the means of 
first revealing it, nor of recovering it through a pro- 
cess of reasoning, if in any instance entirely lost.” 


CHAPTER IV. 

THE INTERPRETATION OF THE RECORD. 


“ The prophets have inquired and searched diligently.” 

** Holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.” 

St. Peter. 


(87) 


* 


CONTENTS. 


Inspiration of the Bible the Basis of Interpretation — Classification of 
Evidences — History of Opinions respecting Inspiration — Claim of 
the Scriptures themselves — Possibility of a Revelation — Mode of 
Revelation by Bodily Appearances, Visions, Words, or Impulses — 
Special Impulse similar to the Ordinary Work of the Spirit, hence 
the Adaptation of the Bible — Inspired Men sometimes rapt beyond 
Consciousness — Degrees of Inspiration — Revelation conformable 
to the Intellectual Status of the Seer — Science not to be sought in 
the Scriptures — Five Rules of Interpretation — Diversity of Interpre- 
tation from Diversities of Character and Many-sidedness of Truth. 


( 88 ) 


CHAPTER IV. 


THE INTERPRETATION OF THE RECORD. 

The manner in which we should interpret the Bible 
is a subject of fundamental importance to the Chris- 
tian student, not only that he may be able to deter- 
mine the sense for himself, but also that he may reject 
false criticism by readily recognizing its point of de- 
parture from correct principle. 

The infidel objections of the rationalistic school are 
directed not so much against the antiquity and gen- 
uineness of the Scriptures, as against the doctrines 
and history deduced therefrom, on the ground of 
certain alleged discrepancies and inconsistencies. It 
assumes the right and the ability to judge what is 
proper to be revealed from Heaven, and as a general 
rule reduces the Bible to the level of ordinary books. 
It considers the Scriptures as containing the opinions 
of Paul, or David, or Moses, or other writers, entitled 
to respect because of their genius and antiquity, but 
the truth or falsity of whose views must be judged of 
by men's own intuitions and convictions. It is ready 
to explain a difficult doctrine or a marvelous fact by 
some mythical or mystical system of interpretation ; 
and if this will not avail, it boldly, if not contempt- 
uously, spurns the record. 

Our views of the meaning and application of Scrip- 
8* ( 89 ) 


9 ° 


Classes of Evidence. 


ture teaching will depend mainly on the opinions we 
have formed respecting its authority or inspiration. 
Hence the inspiration of the Bible must first be in- 
vestigated, as the basis of its interpretation. 

The evidences of Christianity, as they are called, or 
the proofs in favor of the claim of the Bible to be 
considered a revelation from God, are very numerous. 
The usual mode of classifying them is to divide them 
into — 1st, external; and 2d, internal. Each of these 
classes requires a subdivision into (a) the Divine, and 
(, b ) the human. The external Divine are miracles and 
prophecy; the external human are the historical proofs 
of the authenticity and genuineness of the books of 
Scripture. The internal Divine are the accordance of 
the doctrines with the moral sense and spiritual wants 
of men and with the expectations we should form 
antecedently of the contents of a revelation ; the in- 
ternal human are the critical evidences of undesigned 
coincidence. Each class of evidence has been fully 
treated of by various writers. It is the aim of the 
present work to show the harmony of some of the 
principal doctrines of Scripture with a true scientific 
investigation of the teachings of Nature. 

The Bible professes to be a revelation from Heaven, 
dating back in its origin to the earliest ages of the 
world. It will, therefore, present traces of the same 
handiwork, the same Divine ideas, which we find in 
the world around us. Properly interpreted, the Scrip- 
tures can never contradict the teachings of real science. 
To understand the true system of interpretation is, 
therefore, essential to our plan, since it occupies the 


History of Opinions. 


9i 


same relation to revelation which science holds to 
nature, — as an exhibitor of the true ideas of the Di- 
vine mind. 

Extreme views have been held with respect to the 
inspiration of the Scriptures. One regards the entire 
book as so fully inspired by the spirit of truth as to 
exclude the possibility of error. Of course, on this 
view, interpretation becomes a mere question of 
grammar. The opposite opinion denies the super- 
natural character of the Bible, and regards it simply 
as the expression of the genius and piety of the 
writers, or of the opinions and spirit of the time and 
country in which they lived. Those who hold this 
opinion will interpret the teachings of the Scriptures 
on a rationalistic basis, in the light of their own con- 
victions and intuitions and even prejudices. 

Between these extremes, many intermediate views 
have been held at different times, with greater or less 
distinctness. The ancient Jews felt the highest rever- 
ence for their Scriptures, and took care to count every 
verse and letter in every book, and to retain every 
large and small letter, etc. as it occurred in the most 
ancient manuscripts. The modern Jews regard the 
Prophets and Psalms as inferior to the law. The 
early Christian Fathers regarded the Scriptures as 
‘‘the true words of the Holy Ghost.” Tertullian, 
however, allowed that the apostles were at times 
permitted to speak their own words, as where St. Paul 
says, ‘‘To the rest speak I, not the Lord.” Chrysos- 
tom and Jerome also admitted the human element in 
the Scriptures, as seen in the slight variations in the 


9 2 


Claim of the Scriptures . 


different narratives of the same event. The church 
of the Middle Ages held that the books of the Bible 
were in a peculiar and distinct sense the lively oracles 
of God, although Abelard taught that the prophets 
sometimes spoke from their own minds, and that the 
apostles were liable to error, as St. Peter respecting 
circumcision, who was reproved by St. Paul. The 
watchword of the Reformation was, “The sufficiency 
of the Scriptures for salvation,” in opposition to tra- 
dition, or the unwritten teaching of the church. The 
natural inclination was to a very high esteem for the 
Bible, although some of the leading reformers held 
to a somewhat freer view of inspiration than the rest. 
The Calvinistic reformers held to the plenary and 
even verbal inspiration of the Scriptures, so that some 
of the Swiss Confessions speak of simple dictation by 
the Holy Ghost. The Remonstrants and Arminians, 
however, made clear distinctions between the Divine 
and the human elements in the writers of the Old 
and New Testaments. Of all the parties in the 
church since the Reformation, the Socinians have 
always tended most to loose and rationalistic views. 

Definite theories of inspiration were seldom pro- 
pounded until of late years, when the spread of 
rationalizing speculations, the spirit of theological 
criticism, and the rapid discoveries of modern science, 
have given birth both to theories and controversies 
respecting them.* 

Whatever views of inspiration we may adopt, the 


* See Essay on Inspiration, by E. H. Browne, in “ Aids to Faith.” 


Variety in the Sacred Writers . 93 

most cursory examination of the Scriptures them- 
selves will show that they claim to be the utterances 
of Divine wisdom, — the expression of the very ideas 
which the Holy Spirit intended. They recognize the 
existence and universal sovereignty of a personal 
Deity as a fact well known from the most ancient 
times, and they profess to record the personal acts 
and words of Jehovah at various times in the history 
of mankind, chiefly respecting the development of a 
system of facts and occurrences relating to the moral 
renovation of mankind. Christ and his apostles 
frequently refer to the Old Testament Scriptures as 
containing the elements of the Christian dispensation 
and predictions respecting it, and assert for these 
writings Divine inspiration and authority. So inter- 
woven are the facts and ideas of the entire volume 
that no part of the canon can be removed without 
marring the harmony and perfection of the whole. 
Every book forms part of a system, the central idea 
of which is that of Divine interposition and revela- 
tion. This view, however, is perfectly consistent with 
the necessity, in the sacred writers, of diligent and 
faithful research, with the expression of the same 
thought in different words, with such differences 
between the accounts of inspired men as would be 
likely to arise from the different standpoints of each, 
with quotations from other inspired authorities, with 
the employment of uninspired documents, and with 
the peculiarities of style and manner arising from 
diversities of intellectual structure and from educa- 
tional or other influences. 


94 


Biblical Idea of God . 


In our last chapter we argued that external Nature 
is only competent to communicate ideas of material 
things, while psychological experience is limited to 
the knowledge of man’s own faculties and his power 
of tracing relations. This excludes all spiritual ideas 
whatever, as the idea of God, spirit, etc. Hence' 
revelation is the only possible source of ideas per- 
taining to spirit; and if these ideas first occurred in 
the Bible, its writers must have been inspired from 
the world of spirits. We now inquire how a revela- 
tion can be made, or the manner in which the spirit- 
ual and invisible world can manifest itself in the 
sphere of the visible. Of course, every consistent 
deist admits the possibility of such a revelation, for 
if Nature be the work of a personal God, the order 
of Nature reveals the harmony of the Divine ideas. 
If man, also, have a spiritual as well as a physical 
nature, his volitions manifest the character of his 
mind. Every embodied thought, therefore, is a 
proof of the reality of a spiritual communication in 
the sphere of the natural world, unless we adopt the 
wildest of the pantheistic and physical theories of 
life; and even on this theory the natural is the mani- 
festation or expression of the spiritual, or rather 
identical with it. 

The Christian conception of God is that of a purely 
spiritual essence, exalted above all that is finite, and 
yet, since He reveals and imparts himself to the 
world, as having a definite relation to the created uni- 
verse. It is this relation which causes the biblical 
idea to differ so widely from that of pantheism. 


The Angel-Jehovah. 


95 


The spiritual essence and distinction of God from 
the world have led in the progress of thought to the 
idea of a medium by which God creates the world, 
works upon it, and reveals himself to it. This was 
supposed to have its ground in the Divine nature 
itself, and yet to be in some manner distinct from it. 
Such was the view of Philo concerning the Logos, 
traces of which may also be seen in the doctrine of 
Plato, and in the system of Zoroaster, in which H on- 
over is represented as the Word by which the world 
was created, — the most immediate revelation of the 
god Ormuzd.* 

The oldest form of revelation referred to in the 
Old Testament is the Theophany, — the manifes- 
tation or appearance of God either in a bodily 
form which the external senses could perceive, or 
in visions and dreams which the internal sense 
observed. 

Manifestations of God in bodily form are ascribed 
to the angel of the Lord , — the Angel-Jehovah, — who 
claims Divine power, honor, and names for himself, ac- 
cepts of worship and sacrifices, and is usually regarded 
as God by those to whom He appears. These temporary 
appearances of the Divine nature prefigured the perma- 
nent incarnation of God in his Son, Jesus Christ, who 
is the most perfect revelation of the Father, and who 
by word and spirit and work and example has ex- 
hibited all we need for our salvation; for the truth 
is in Jesus; He is the Truth, the Life, and the Way, 


Hagenbach’s History of Doctrines. 


g6 Scientific Probabilities of Revelation . 

the great object of all previous revelations and of all 
sacred history. 

In addition to the personal appearances of God him- 
self, we find in the Scriptures frequent allusions to 
the ministry of angels, who are represented as a 
higher order of intelligence than mankind, and of 
great power, usually invisible, yet occasionally com- 
missioned to manifest themselves to the bodily 
senses. 

These appearances were not imaginative and illu- 
sory, but real ; the bodily forms had bodily qualities. 
Thus, in the infantile age of the world, the angels ate 
with Abraham, and Jacob wrestled bodily with his 
antagonist at Peniel. As the world grew in knowl- 
edge of the Divine purposes, these representations 
became more spiritual and less analogous to natural 
modes. Thus the offering of Gideon to the angel 
was consumed by fire out of the rock, and in a 
still later age the visions of Isaiah and of Ezekiel 
surpassed all ordinary forms whatever. There is 
nothing improbable, in a scientific view, in these em- 
bodiments of spiritual existences. Man himself may 
be regarded, scientifically, as a compound of matter 
and spirit, — matter so joined to spirit that it lives 
and is made subject to new modes or laws of being. 

The most common opinion attributes to angels 
real though rarefied bodies, of varying properties, 
capable of transit from world to world, and of be- 
coming visible or invisible, tangible or impassible, 
at pleasure. Another view, however, considers them 
as capable of assuming bodies other than their own 


View of Angelic Transmigration. 97 

proper vehicle of communication with the material 
universe. This opinion considers that “the relation 
of mind to matter subsists between the being en- 
dowed with life and the ultimate molecules of ma- 
terial substance. The individual atoms thus brought 
into connection with the living being are perpetually 
changing. Fresh molecules are continually brought 
into this relation, while the old ones are cast off. Thus, 
also, the number of atoms under the control of any 
living being is always varying. In the case of man, 
these changes are accomplished according to certain 
organic laws ; nevertheless volition enters largely as 
an element into their operation. Now, it is not push- 
ing the method of reasoning by analogy too far, to 
suppose that in the case of angels the element of 
volition may enter more largely into the process, and 
that these beings may be endowed with a faculty of 
altering at pleasure the material molecules, both as 
regards individuality and number, with which their 
minds are in immediate relation. Going a step fur- 
ther, we may imagine that, when it becomes needful 
for any special purpose, they have the power of 
withdrawing their spirits completely from all con- 
nection with the ponderable atoms.”* 

On this hypothesis, a spirit may disengage himself 
from his usual organism, and, in a way similar to the 
vibrations of light or of electricity, may traverse the 
ether until he reaches our planet, and then, assem- 
bling around him a sufficiency of atoms to constitute 


* The Material Universe, by M. Ponton. 


9 8 


Other Modes of Revelation . 


a temporary organism, resembling or identical in 
structure with a human body, will be brought into a 
condition qualifying him to discharge his commission. 
His message delivered, he may dissipate his tempo- 
rary body and return as he came. There is, to say 
the least, nothing contradictory or irrational in this 
view, and it may serve to show that there is a way in 
which bodily appearances and communications may 
be made from the spiritual world. 

The only conceivable modes of direct revelation 
from the world of spirits, other than by bodily appear- 
ances and actions, are visions, words, or impulses. A 
pictorial representation must be made to the eye or 
imagination of the seer, or words must be uttered 
which are intelligible to his mind, ora special impulse 
must be afforded to his mental faculties. 

Each of these modes of revelation is referred to in 
the Scriptures as occurring in different dispensations 
and at different times. God has at sundry times and 
in divers manners spoken unto the fathers by the 
prophets, and in these last days has spoken unto us 
by his Son. The manner in which the Bible exhibits 
a Divine revelation to have been made will suggest 
to us the true principles of interpretation. It is the 
true key to the meaning of Holy Writ. 

Pictorial representation to the eye or imagination 
was frequent among the prophets of the Old Testa- 
ment, and characterizes the Apocalypse in the New. 
Jacob’s vision at Bethel, Joseph’s prophetic dreams, 
the visions of Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Daniel, etc., 
and a number of references in the New Testament, are 


Verbal Revelation . 


99 


examples. Hugh Miller, in his “ Testimony of the 
Rocks,” refers to this manner of revelation respecting 
past events of which the seer was necessarily ignorant. 
He quotes a number of ancient commentators in con- 
firmation of his views, and applies it to the account 
of the creation given in the book of Genesis. He 
supposes the prophet to have received a series of 
visions illustrating or typifying those periods in which 
the earth was being prepared for man’s abode. Each 
of those pictorial visions, he supposes, took up a nat- 
ural day, and that the phrases, “The evening and the 
morning were the first day,” — “second,” — “third day,” 
etc., refer to the representations, and not to the cre- 
ative processes themselves. While this ingenious 
theory is not at all needed to reconcile the teachings 
of geology with the book of Genesis, there is no 
doubt of its application to many parts of Scripture, 
both historical and prophetical. 

The question may be asked, whether a warm and 
fertile imagination might not account for the origin of 
such visions, as in reveries, or waking dreams, or in 
the dramatic conceptions of the poets. Such a thought 
would scarcely occur to one who regards the Bible as 
entire, and remembers how all parts fit together, form- 
ing a complete system. It is altogether different from 
anything we know of imagination, to see a series of 
visions by different persons and in different times and 
places, during an interval of more than a thousand 
years, all referring to the development of the same 
facts, and permeated by similar sentiments. Again, 
from the nature of imagination it may be readily seen 


IOO 


Special Impulses. 


that it has no power to invent any new ideas what- 
ever. Its sole office is that of combining ideas which 
were otherwise received. It has no power except to 
form images out of preconceived notions. Now, the 
visions of the prophets contained new and original 
ideas, and special predictions which could have had 
no elementary existence in their previous experience, 
but were evidently real revelations. 

The same thing is true of revelation by means of 
intelligible words, — so often referred to in the Scrip- 
tures and often introduced by the formula of “ Thus 
saith the Lord.” We may consider it either as a real 
sound, or a strong impression on the mind, of Divine 
origin. Were it other than a real revelation, how does 
it happen that imagination and mesmeric excitement 
have never discovered a new spiritual truth, or referred 
to one whose root and essence are not in the Bible ? 
Verbal revelation has an advantage over pictorial, as 
being better adapted to the communication of abstract 
truth and argumentative reasoning. 

The last mode mentioned, viz., special impulses 
communicated by the Divine Spirit to the faculties, 
differs not in kind, but only in degree and application, 
from the Divine aid which is promised to every sin- 
cere and earnest Christian. Supernatural grace and 
direction are afforded to every one who will do God’s 
will, that he may “know of the doctrine.” “For 
what man knoweth the things of a man, save the 
spirit of man which is in him ? even so the things of 
God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God. Now 
we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the 


Adaptation of the Bible. ioi 

spirit which is of God ; that we might know the things 
that are freely given to us of God.” “ Hereby we 
know that He abideth in us, by the spirit which He 
hath given us.” In the apostles and writers of Sacred 
Scripture, however, the Holy Spirit not only impelled 
their faculties so that they understood their personal 
relation to God, and by correspondence to that im- 
pulse were enabled to live sanctified lives, but it also 
impelled them to communicate the truth with such 
clearness and propriety as to express .the mind of the 
Spirit. And as the needle points towards the pole 
when touched with the same magnetic influence as 
the earth itself, so the mind which has received the 
Divine Spirit recognizes the Divine teaching. This 
is the reason why many unlearned Christians are so 
little disturbed by the objections of infidelity. From 
this cause also arises the wonderful adaptation of the 
teachings of Scripture to the ever-varying conditions 
of mankind, notwithstanding the diversities existing 
as to their literal meaning. 

The correspondence of Scripture teaching with 
our highest religious impulses is a subjective argu- 
ment for inspiration. “ In the skeptical writings of the 
day the argument is rarely stated, except to be dealt 
with as a form of a natural but not very harmless 
illusion. Yet it is an argument of the greatest force 
and importance, and an argument which, if rightly 
handled, it is much easier to set aside than to answer. 
Is it nothing that the Bible has spoken to millions 
upon millions of hearts, as it were, with the voice of 
God himself? Have not its words burned within 

9 * 


102 Study of the Bible its own Reward. 

till men have seen palpably the Divine in that which 
spake to them ? Is it not a fact that convictions on 
the nature of the Scriptures deepen with deepening 
study of them? Ask the simple man, to whom the 
Bible has long been the daily friend and counselor, 
who reads and applies what he reads as far as his 
.natural powers enable him, — ask him whether longer 
and more continued study has altered, to any extent, 
his estimate of the Book as a Divine revelation. 
What is the invariable answer? The Book ‘has 
found him;’ it has consoled him in sorrows for which 
there seemed no consolation on this side the grave • 
it has wiped away tears that it seemed could only be 
wiped away in that far land where sadness shall be 
no more; it has pleaded gently during long seasons 
of spiritual coldness; it has infused strength in hours 
of weakness ; it has calmed in moments of excite- 
ment; it has given to better emotions a permanence, 
and to stirred-up feelings a reality; it has made 
itself felt to be what it is; out of the abundance of 
his heart his mouth speaks, and he tells us with all 
the accumulated convictions of an honest mind that, 
if he once deemed the Bible to be fully inspired on 
the testimony of others, now he knows it on evidence 
that has been brought home to his own soul. He 
has now long had the witness in himself, and that 
witness he feels and knows is unchangeably and 
enduringly true. 

“Ask, again, the professed student of Scripture, 
the scholar, the divine, the interpreter, one who, to 
what we may term the testimony of the soul in the 


Inexhaustible Blessing in Study of the Bible. 103 

case of the less cultivated reader can add the testi- 
mony of the mind and the spirit, — ask such a one 
whether increased familiarity with Scripture has 
quickened or obscured his perception of the Divine 
within it, whether it has led him to higher or lower 
views of inspiration. Have not, we may perhaps 
anxiously ask, the difficulties of Scripture wearied 
him, its seeming discordancies perplexed, its obscu- 
rities depressed him? Have not the tenor of its 
arguments, and the seeming want of coherence and 
connection in adjacent sentences, sometimes awakened 
uneasy and disquieting thoughts? What is almost 
invariably the answer? ‘ No ; far otherwise.’ Deep- 
ened study has brought its blessing and its balm. It 
has shown how what might seem the greatest diffi- 
culties often turn merely upon our ignorance of one 
or two unrecorded facts or relations; it has conducted 
to standing-points where in a moment all that has 
hitherto seemed confused and distorted has arranged 
itself in truest symmetry and in the fairest perspec- 
tive. In many an obscure passage our student will 
tell us how the light has ofttimes suddenly broken, 
how he has been cheered by being permitted to 
recognize and identify the commingling of human 
weakness and Divine power, the mighty revelation 
almost too great for mortal utterance, the ‘earthen 
vessel’ almost parting asunder from the greatness and 
abundance of the heavenly treasure committed to 
it. He will tell us, again, how in many a portion 
where the logical connection has seemed suspended 
or doubtful, — in one of those discourses, for instancy 


104 The Seers sometimes rapt beyond themselves. 

of his Lord as recorded by St. John, — the true con- 
nection has at length slowly and mysteriously dis- 
closed itself, how he has perceived and realized all. 
For awhile he has felt himself thinking as his Saviour 
vouchsafed to think, in part beholding truth as those 
Divine eyes beheld it; for a brief space his mind has 
seemed to be consciously one with the mind of 
Christ. All this he has perceived and felt. And he 
will tell us, perchance, what has often been the 
sequel, — how he has risen from his desk and fallen on 
his knees, and, with uplifted voice, blessed and adored 
Almighty God for his gift of the Book of Life.”* 

In connection with this subject of spiritual impulses 
as a mode of revelation there is one principle which 
must not be overlooked. The ancients believed that 
one fully possessed with Divine impulse was merely 
a passive agent, and did not himself understand, and 
could not explain to others, what he spake while he 
was inspired. The heathen regarded their sooth- 
sayers and oracles, when they pretended to prophesy, 
as carried away with a divine madness, a sacred 
intoxication, which deprived them of their own 
powers of consciousness and reflection. The early 
Jews, also, according to the Talmud, taught that, in 
many instances, the prophets themselves did not 
understand the import of what they predicted. Now, 
while it was generally true that the spirits of the 
prophets were subject to the prophets, yet there are 
parts of Scripture where this principle of passivity in 


* Rev. C. J. Ellicott, in “ Aids to Faith. : 


Bible anticipates Science. 


105 


those inspired is clearly recognized. Thus, it is said 
of Balaam that the Lord put words in his mouth. 
Numb, xxiii. 5. So Caiaphas the high-priest un- 
wittingly prophesied that it was expedient that one 
should die for the people. John, xi. 49-52. St. Peter 
also affirms that the prophets searched diligently 
lespecting the prophecies of Christ which were made 
through them. I. Pet. i. 1 1 ; II. Pet. i. 20. 

Analogous to this form of inspiration are those 
passages of Scripture in which language is so used 
as to develop thought and anticipate discoveries in 
science. Thus, in Genesis, where it is said that God 
made two great lights, the Hebrew word has the 
sense of light-bearers, thus anticipating the modern 
discovery that light is separate from the body of the 
sun. Another passage of a similar kind is found in 
the sublime description given of Wisdom in the book 
of Proverbs: “Before the mountains were settled, be- 
fore the hills was I brought forth: while as yet He 
had not made the earth, nor the fields, nor the highest 
part of the dust of the world.” But recently geology 
came to the conclusion that the highest parts of the 
earth were the oldest, yet the Bible revealed it ages 
ago. We can but allude to the subject of such 
incidental evidences of supernatural knowledge; to 
point them out is the province of a commentator. 

The majority of modern theologians hold to three 
degrees of inspiration as applied to the Scriptures. 
The first and highest degree is the revelation of 
things before unknown to the writers. The second 
degree is the security against error which God af- 


io 6 Revelation chiefly illustrative. 

forded to the writers in the exhibition of facts and 
doctrines with which they were already acquainted 
The third degree is the authority given by the ap- 
probation of inspired men to writings originally com- 
posed without inspiration, as the genealogies and 
historical compilations found in some parts of the 
Old Testament, etc. 

Let us now apply these principles to interpretation. 
From what we have seen respecting the mode of 
spiritual communications, it follows that every reve- 
lation to the intellect must necessarily be chiefly 
illustrative. Spiritual and Divine truths come to us 
through earthly mediums. The vision of the seer 
symbolized or exhibited the truth in natural imageiy, 
since no other was possible. The words which fell 
upon the ear of the prophet were used in their con- 
ventional meaning, since no other meaning would 
have conveyed the idea. Hence it also follows that 
revelation conformed necessarily to the educational 
status of those to whom it came. It is true that in 
some instances the seer was rapt, or carried away, 
beyond his own sphere of thought; but this was 
rather exceptional than usual. Had it been com- 
mon, the revelation would have been unintelligible 
to the generation which received it. These instances 
of direct verbal inspiration are marks of miraculous 
knowledge, and are external Divine evidences of 
authority pertaining to the class of prophecy. 

We gather, therefore, from the manner of the rev- 
elation that the Bible should be explained in its 
grammatical sense, as we would interpret any other 


Seeming Contradictions . 


107 


book, but with special reference to the language, 
customs, and ideas of the age of the world in which 
it was written; remembering always that it is a rev- 
elation of spiritual truth communicated chiefly in 
illustrations and figurative language, and making 
use of the history, chronology, and other sciences 
of the age as vehicles or accessories. 

This principle will explain those seeming contra- 
dictions which result from the use of popular lan- 
guage, as when Joshua commanded the sun and 
moon to stand still, — the sun going forth from one 
end of heaven to the other, etc. It will even justify 
many actual errors in science, chronology, and his- 
tory, should such be found to exist. The Scriptures 
were not intended to teach men these things, but to 
reveal what relates to man’s connection with moral 
law, and the spiritual world, and his salvation from 
sin. In order to teach these truths, the biblical 
writers availed themselves of the popular language 
and the current science and literature of the age 
in which they lived, so as to be intelligible to their 
contemporaries. As in the present day a man may 
be well instructed in the mysteries of the kingdom 
of heaven, and “ have an unction from the Holy 
One,” while ignorant of or a disbeliever in the teach- 
ings of modern science, so likewise it was possible 
to those who first received religious truth and were 
commissioned to declare it. The presence of the 
Holy Spirit preserved from errors in science no more 
in the one case than in the other. A revelation of 
spiritual truth, of universal interest to mankind 


108 Science not to be sought in the Sciiptures. 

might have been made to the Bedouin Arabs or 
Chinese. Yet in reality the majority of inspired men 
were far from ignorant. Many of the writers of Scrip- 
ture were learned in the scholarship of their day, and 
through them the most lucid accounts of ancient 
times, and fragments of ancient literature, and copies 
or abstracts from ancient genealogies, have come 
down to us which would otherwise have been utterly 
lost. Yet whoever undertakes to construct a science 
out of their incidental allusions will find it labor in 
vain. It was no part of their mission to teach science. 
One may as well seek to study surveying in a bi- 
ography of Washington as the details of cosmogony 
or chronology in Genesis. This is the mistake of 
those who write “ Harmonies of the Gospels,” as well 
as others. It may, indeed, gratify a laudable curiosity 
to examine the chronological succession of recorded 
events, and may furnish additional confirmation of 
historic fidelity, but it is not necessary to prove the 
truth of the Evangelists. Dr. Smith has well said 
that “ the inspiration of an historical writing will 
consist in its truth, and in its selection of events. 
Everything narrated must be substantially and ex- 
actly true; and the comparison of the gospels one 
with another offers us nothing that does not answer 
to this test. There are differences of arrangement 
of events ; here some details of a narrative or a dis- 
course are supplied which are wanted there ; and 
if the writer had professed to follow a strict chrono- 
logical order, or had pretended that his record was 
not only true but complete, then one inversion of 


Human Element in the Bible. 


109 


order, or one omission of a syllable, would convict 
him of inaccuracy. But if it is plain — if it is all but 
avowed — that minute chronological data are not part 
of the writer’s purpose, — if it is also plain that no- 
thing but a selection of the facts is intended, or, in- 
deed, possible (John, xxi. 25), then the proper test to 
apply is, whether each gives us a picture of the life 
and ministry of Jesus of Nazareth that is self-con- 
sistent and consistent with the others, such as would 
be suitable to the use of those who were to believe 
on his Name ; for this is their evident intention.”* 

Many of the apparent contradictions in the Bible 
may be explained by the mistakes of transcribers, or in 
some other way equally natural; but, “as the Bishop 
of London has well remarked, ‘ When laborious in- 
genuity has exerted itself to collect a whole store of 
such difficulties, supposing them to be real, what on 
earth does it signify ? They may quietly float away 
without our being able to solve them, if we bear in 
mind the acknowledged fact that there is a human 
element in the Bible.’ 

“ What if many of the numbers given in Exodus 
should, as Bishop Colenso asserts, be inaccurate? 
What is to be gained by assertions or denials relative 
to matters which have forever passed out of the reach 
of our verification ? What if, here and there, a law 
should seem to us strange and unaccountable ; an 
event difficult to comprehend ; a statement to involve 
an apparent contradiction? What has all this to do 


10 


* Smith’s New Testament History. 


iio Eveiy Part of Scripture useful. 

with the essential value of the book ? Absolutely 
nothing, unless thereby its truthfulness can be set 
aside. 

“ If error were in the Bible cunningly interspersed 
with truth, the case would be different. But it is not 
so. The book, as a whole and as it stands, is whole- 
some and useful ; each portion of it has its proper 
place and is adequate to fulfill its appointed end. 
Everything has its purpose to fulfill and its object to 
accomplish, whether, properly speaking, inspired or 
not. Nothing may be despised, nothing pronounced 
superfluous. But everything in the book does not 
take hold alike on the heart and conscience. It may 
be very interesting, as indeed it is, to trace on the 
map the various journeyings of St. Paul, or the wan- 
derings of the children of Israel in the wilderness ; 
to note a hundred undesigned coincidences; to study 
and try to reconcile two apparently conflicting gene- 
alogies ; to examine into and to discuss the chronol- 
ogy, the geography, or the natural history of Pales- 
tine. All this and much more may be done ; and it 
is fitting that in its time and place it should be done; 
yet it may be accomplished without the slightest 
moral or spiritual benefit arising to the man who is 
thus occupied.” * 

From the principle of interpretation referred to 
above, we may deduce the rules laid down by theo- 
logians as applicable to the Scriptures. Ellicott has 
briefly summed them up as follows : “ Interpret gram- 


* “ Liber Librorum.’ 


Rules of Interpretation . 1 1 1 

matically, historically, contextually, and minutely,” 
and “ interpret according to the analogy of faith.” 

The first rule is to interpret grammatically. This 
would seem almost superfluous ; yet “ there is a strong 
desire evinced in many quarters to evade the rule, and, 
under cover of escape from pedantry, to endeavor to 
make Scripture mean what we think, or what we wish, 
not what it really says to us.” In place of the nat- 
ural and obvious meaning, we are exhorted to inter- 
pret by means of mystical “ correspondences,” or by 
our own “ verifying faculty” to rectify the imperfect 
utterances of words “of which it is assumed we have 
caught the real and intended meaning.” Such a pro- 
cedure applied to other literature would produce end- 
less confusion. On such a principle “ Mother Goose’s 
Melodies” might be regarded as a treatise on moral 
philosophy, and romance be extracted from the most 
didactic compositions. 

St. George Mivart quotes from Mr. Tylor’s “ Primi- 
tive Culture” an amusing parody of certain recent at- 
tempts to explain almost all early history and legend 
by myths of dawn and sunrise. It will equally apply 
to some violations of our first rule. Mr. Tylor says, 
with respect to the “Song of Sixpence:” “Obviously, 
the four-and-twenty blackbirds are the four-and-twenty 
hours, and the pie that holds them is the underlying 
earth covered with the overarching sky. How true a 
touch of nature it is that when the pie is opened — that 
is, when day breaks — the birds begin to sing ! The 
king is the sun, and his counting out his money is 
pouring out the sunshine, the golden shower of Danae. 


1 12 


Rules of Interpretation. 


The queen is the moon, and her transparent honey 
the moonlight. The maid is the rosy-fingered dawn, 
who rises before the sun her master, and hangs out 
the clouds, his clothes, across the sky. The particular 
blackbird who so tragically ends the tale by snipping 
off her nose is the hour of sunrise.” Mr. Tylor 
similarly explains the life and death of Julius Caesar.* 

The second rule is to interpret historically. This 
requires us to illustrate by reference to history, topog- 
raphy, and antiquities. We should transport our- 
selves in thought to the age and country in which the 
writer lived, and the scenes surrounding him, so as to 
realize, as far as possible, his original conception. Our 
only object is to find the idea intended by the inspir- 
ing Spirit. This necessitates, of course, industrious 
study and research, in order that the full force of the 
language may be understood. We need not expect 
to develop the meaning of Scripture with less labor 
than scholars bestow upon other ancient writings. 

The third rule is to interpret under the limitations 
assigned by the context. This is to inquire for the 
design of the writer, and to give the words not only 
the meaning but the application he intended in that 
place where we find them. The want of attending to 
this rule has been the origin of many a fanciful and 
illogical interpretation. 

The fourth rule is to elicit the full significance of 
all details. The importance of this rule will be evi- 
dent when we remember “ that in every case words 


* Lessons from Nature, p. 146. 


Rules of Interpretation . 1 1 3 

are the appointed media of ideas and sentiments, and 
believe, in the case of Scripture, that both the ideas 
are heaven-sent and the sentiment inspired.” This 
rule, however, admits of but limited application in 
the case of metaphors and parables, where the general 
teaching of the whole is evidently intended, rather 
than a minute application of details. 

The fifth rule is to interpret according to the anal- 
ogy of faith. This is a scriptural term, used by St. 
Paul in Rom. xii. 6. We consider it synonymous 
with several other passages, as “ the Scriptures,” “ all 
the law,” “the mouth of all the prophets,” etc. It 
might be rendered “ the general tenor of the Scrip- 
tures.” Mr. Ellicott refers it to the creeds, as the 
authorized exposition of the faith of the church ; but 
this elevates a merely human production to a superi- 
ority over Divine revelation. As the Bible is a com- 
munication. of spiritual truth in human language, it is 
not to be classed with any merely human composition 
whatever, and mtist be interpreted in accordance with 
its own design and general meaning. Creeds are 
useful as showing what learned and pious men have 
gathered from Scripture teaching, and as compen- 
diums of Bible truth ; but, after all, we must refer them 
“ to the law and to the testimony ; for if they speak 
not according to this word, there is no life in them.” 

“ It is thus that philosophy interprets natural ap- 
pearances. When once a general law is established, 
particular facts are placed under it, and any appear- 
ance that seems contradictory is specially examined ; 
and of the two explanations of the apparent anomaly 


1 14 Rules of Interpretation. 

that one is selected which harmonizes best with the 
general law.”* 

Respecting diversities of interpretation, the author 
of the book entitled “ Liber Librorum” (from many 
of whose teachings we dissent) has well said that 
“ only as Scripture is allowed to adapt itself to the 
peculiar mental and moral condition of each individ- 
ual, do its words become ‘ spirit and life’ to him, ruling 
his conduct and reigning in his affections. Instead, 
therefore, of finding an occasion of stumbling in the 
fact that diversities of view on many points always 
have, and probably always will, characterize Chris- 
tians, we might rather discover in the wonderful adap- 
tation of Divine teaching to each, evidence of the 
source from which it comes. For it is at once one 
and yet diverse; unchanging and yet endowed with 
a capacity of all but infinite fitness to every variety 
of character. Just as material light, although the 
same to all, is yet different to persons of imperfect 
vision, suffering under diverse forms of disease, so is 
spiritual illumination a different thing to men in dif- 
ferent stages of the Divine life, with vaiying intel- 
lectual powers, and, above all, with conflicting wills, 
passions, and interests; and just as it would be im- 
possible to temper the light of the sun so that it 
should leave precisely the same impression on every 
optic nerve, whether sound or otherwise, so is it 
neither possible nor desirable that Divine truth should 
come home to the man who is jaundiced by his pre- 


Angus’s Handbook. 


Spirit of an Interpreter. 1 1 5 

judices, or drugged by his sins, precisely as it does 
to the simple and righteous soul who desires to know 
only that he may obey.” 

If we admit the Divine inspiration of the Scriptures, 
we should approach their interpretation in a teachable 
spirit, with earnest prayers for the promised illumi- 
nation of the self-same Spirit by whom they were first 
communicated. Nor should we imagine that all the 
truth contained in Holy Writ can be bounded by our 
own conceptions. A good model for a Christian 
student may be found in the following passage from 
St. Augustine’s “Confessions:” “I would hear and 
understand how ‘ In the beginning Thou madest the 
heaven and earth.’ Moses wrote this, wrote and de- 
parted, — passed hence from Thee to Thee. Nor is 
he now before me ; for if he were* I would hold him, 
and ask him, and beseech him by Thee to open these 
things unto me, and would lay the ears of my body 
to the sounds bursting out of his mouth. And should 
he speak Hebrew, in vain would it strike on my senses, 
nor would aught of it touch my mind ; but if Latin, 
I should know what he said. But whence should I 
know whether he spake the truth? Yea, and if I 
knew this also, should I know it from him ? Truly 
within me, within, in the chamber of my thoughts, 
Truth, who is neither Hebrew, nor Greek, nor Latin, 
nor barbarian, without organs of voice, or tongue, or 
sound of syllables, would say, ‘It is truth;’ and I 
forthwith should say confidently to that man of thine, 
‘Thou sayest truly.’ Whereas, then, I cannot inquire 
of Moses, Thee I beseech, O Truth, being filled with 


ii 6 Various Interpretations may be true. 

whom, he spake truth ; Thee, my God, I beseech, for- 
give my sins ; and Thou, who gavest him to speak 
these things, give to me also to understand them.” 
Augustine understood the “ heaven” to mean that 
spiritual and incorporeal creation which cleaves to 
God unintermittingly, always beholding his counte- 
nance; and “ earth,” the formless matter whereof the 
corporeal crpation was afterwards formed ; but he was 
very far from so insisting on his own views as to re- 
ject other interpretations, since he believed that Scrip- 
ture was so deep and full that manifold senses might 
be drawn from it, all consistent with truth. He re- 
marks, “ So when one says, ‘ Moses meant as I do/ 
and another, ‘ Nay, but as I do/ I suppose that I speak 
more reverently, ‘ Why not rather as both, if both be 
true ?’ And if there be a third or a fourth, yea, if any 
other seeth any other truth in those words, why may 
not he be believed to have seen all these, through 
whom the One God hath tempered the Holy Scriptures 
to the senses of many, who should see therein things 
true but: diverse ?” If such a spirit generally prevailed 
among interpreters, there would be greater unity in 
the church, and less infidelity to oppose. Truth is a 
unit, but it is a polygon also; and the many-sided 
appropriateness of Scripture is evidence that it is es- 
sential truth. This should never be lost sight of by 
the student who would penetrate deeper than the mere 
surface of things, and know the “ mind of the Spirit,” 
and “ the things which are freely given to us of God.” 


CHAPTER V. 


THE REVELATION OF GOD. 


“ Blind metaphysical necessity, which is certainly the same always ar.d 
everywhere, could produce no variety of tnmgs. All that diversity of 
natural things which we find suited to different times and places could 
arise from nothing but the ideas and will of a Being necessarily existing.” 

Sir Isaac Newton. 


(» 7 ) 


CONTENTS, 


The Idea of God fundamental to Morality — Origin of the Idea — Tend- 
ency of Mankind to Idolatry and Pantheism— Yet Reason finds the 
Idea of a Personal God necessary — Scripture Representation of 
Deity — Names of God — I Am that I Am — Origin of the Inscrip- 
tion at Delphi — Representation of Moses and the Prophets — Fullest 
Revelation of God in the Incarnation — The Scripture Representa- 
tion of God illustrated by the Discoveries of Astronomy and the 
Microscope. 


CHAPTER V. 


THE REVELATION OF GOD. 

The fundamental principle of religion — the basis 
of all religious ideas — is the existence of a personal 
yet infinite God, the Great First Cause of all things. 
What can reason tell us of this? How does the Bible 
represent it ? Are the views of the Bible in accord- 
ance with the legitimate deductions of science? Such 
are the questions we propose. 

The idea we form of God underlies all our morality, 
and modifies every scheme of religious opinion what- 
soever, whether pagan or Christian or skeptical. 
Modern infidelity teaches that God is not a personal, 
intelligent Being, but a sort of universal force, or soul 
of the world, the various manifestations of which 
make up the phenomena of the universe. We have 
seen that arguments against pantheism may be drawn 
from every branch of science, — physical, mental, and 
moral ; still, this idea of 'deified force, or eternal fatal- 
ism, distinguishes its adherents, tinges all their litera- 
ture, and is the foundation of all their philosophy and 
morality. Development and Necessity are the two 
poles of this system, around which all the thoughts 
of its votaries revolve. On the other hand, Christi- 
anity is based upon the fact of a personal and infi- 
nitely perfect God, who holds to our race the relation 

(" 9 ) 


1 20 Origin of the Idea of God. 

of Father, and has constituted mankind a common 
brotherhood. From these relations flow all our obli- 
gations and duties of worship and reciprocity and 
benevolence. Take away from our creed the father- 
hood of God and the brotherhood of man, and you 
leave behind nothing but the worship of brute force. 
Call it development, or evolution, or necessity, or 
anything else, there is nothing left for reverence, if 
we discard a personal God, but unreasoning, unfeel- 
ing force. All the relations and duties of life are 
by such a scheme interfered with, and the law of the 
strongest becomes our only rule of right. It is not, 
therefore, a merely harmless speculation, and a matter 
indifferent, whether we believe in God or Fate ; the very 
foundations of society are based upon such beliefs. 

The question of the origin of the idea of God, like 
that of the origin of matter, or life, or language, or 
society, is one respecting which there is a diversity 
of opinion. Some suppose that the mind of man at 
his birth is like a piece of blank paper, upon which 
nothing is written, and consider that we learn the 
idea of God, as well as other ideas, by experience and 
observation. Others believe that the mind is not a 
blank, but is furnished with a small stock of rational 
principles, which are the germs of future knowledge, 
and that among these germs is the idea of God 
Others, again, — on the grounds of philosophy and 
Scripture, as we think, — believe that the ideas of God 
and duty were given originally by revelation from 
heaven, and that the religious opinions of mankind 
were all derived from that revelation, either by means 


Grecian Theism impersonal. 121 

of the Scriptures, or by traditions of the same truths 
flowing through channels more or less pure from the 
earliest ages of the world. 

Whatever belief we may entertain as to the origin 
of the idea of God, it is important to inquire how much 
we can learn or have learned of God without the aid 
of the Scriptures, except the indirect knowledge flow- 
ing from the influence which they may have exerted 
upon the opinions of the age. This will manifest the 
tendency of humanity when left to itself. This ques- 
tion history supplies us with the means of answering. 
The resemblance of the primitive religious ideas of 
the Greeks to those of the Bible is very distinctly 
traceable in their mythological fables and poetry, and 
these resemblances all their subsequent speculations 
could not wholly obliterate; yet with especial refer- 
ence to the Grecian philosophy the apostle wrote, 
“ The world by wisdom knew not God.” The people, 
indeed, worshiped many gods, but to none of them 
did they attribute the character of an intelligent First 
Cause. They worshiped the air as Jupiter, the ocean 
as Neptune, and other personifications of natural 
phenomena or of abstract qualities; but the true idea 
of a Creator was unknown. The religion of the 
philosophers was the same pantheism which is sought 
to be restored by modern infidelity. None of them, 
not even Socrates, nor Plato, nor Aristotle, conceived 
the idea of a personal God. 

Mr. Farrar says,* “All philosophic theology in 


11 


* Science in Theology. 


122 


Ionic School. 


Greece was pantheistic, i.e. if pantheism be made to 
mean any theory which admits an impersonal First 
Cause, and to include — 1st, the theory which teaches 
an anima mundi ; 2d, that which regards God as 
the sum total of all that exists (pantheism proper) ; and 
3d, that which regards the Deity as an abstraction, 
synonymous with the idea of perfection. Thales 
might possibly represent the first of these views; the 
Eleatics, the second; Anaxagoras, Plato, and Aris- 
totle, the third.” 

Cudworth asserts that “ Plato, in his tenth book of 
Laws, professedly opposing the atheists, and under- 
taking to prove the existence of a Deity, does, not- 
withstanding, ascend no higher than to the Psyche, 
or Universal Mundane Soul, as the self-moving prin- 
ciple, and the immediate or proper cause of all the 
motion which is in the world.” This opinion is ably 
opposed by Professor Tayler Lewis, who regards 
Plato’s use of the term ayaOuq as including all moral 
attributes. Other scholars, however, consider him 
to mean by it only order or harmony. 

Thales regarded water as the or originating 
element, of the universe, doubtless from some per- 
verted tradition of the Mosaic account of the creation, 
where it is said that “ the Spirit of God was brooding 
over the waters.” The succeeding hypotheses of 
Anaximander and Anaximenes, one of whom held 
that air , and the other that infinite space , was the first 
principle, were refinements upon the theory of Thales. 

The Ionic or atheistic school contended that there 
is nothing in the universe but phenomena, — all things 


Modern Pantheists. 


1 23 


being in perpetual flow ; nothing really being, but all 
things ever becoming; as Homer represents when he 
says that Oceanus is the origin of the gods, etc. The 
manner in which Plato represents Socrates as oppos- 
ing this view, and contending that the laws of our 
being compel us to affirm the real and not merely 
the relative existence of the Beautiful, the Good, etc., 
would seem to favor the views of Professor Lewis 
with respect to that author ; yet the general fact of 
the pantheistic or atheistic tendency of Greek phi- 
losophy is undeniable. Thus, Aischylus sings, Zeus 
k'ffztv aiOrjf), Zeus ?£ p?, Zeus di oupavbs, Zeus ra zzavza. 
‘‘Jupiter is the air; Jupiter is the earth; Jupiter 
is the heaven; all is Jupiter.” 

This materialistic philosophy was imported into 
Greece from the Orient, where it still constitutes the 
foundation of Brahminism and Buddhism. From 
Greece it passed into Rome, and, through the Arabian 
restorers of Grecian literature, into modern thought. 
In its various forms of skeptical philosophy or heathen 
idolatry, it has ever been the chief antagonist of re- 
vealed truth, and probably will be until the end of 
the world. At the present day it is encouraged by 
the rhapsodies of the spiritualists, by crude and ill- 
digested theories respecting electricity, by avowed 
skeptics, and by a spirit of theorizing indulged in by 
certain writers who, but for their speculative tenden- 
cies, might establish a reputation as men of science. 

The development of the human mind in the pro- 
gress of history by means of religion and science, if 
it has not been a source of direct information respect- 


124 Sir Isaac Newto?i on Necessity. 

ing the Divine existence, has sufficed to satisfy the 
rational inquirer that pantheism, as well as atheism, 
is wholly unreasonable. Men of the deepest scientific 
research — the master-minds of the world — unite in 
testifying to their belief in a personal Great First 
Cause. Even Kant, who declares that the objective 
reality of a personal God can neither be proved nor 
disproved by pure reason, acknowledges that the idea 
is necessary to reason, — that it “perfects and crowns 
the entire system of human cognitions.” Sir Isaac 
Newton concludes his immortal Principia by declar- 
ing that “ this most beautiful system of the sun, 
planets, and comets could only proceed from the 
counsel and dominion of an intelligent and powerful 
Being. . . . This Being,” he says, “ governs all things, 
not as the soul of the world, but as Lord over all ;” 
and the argument proving that he is not the soul of 
the world he sums up in these words : “ Blind meta- 
physical necessity, which is certainly the same always 
and everywhere, could produce no variety of things. 
All that diversity of natural things which we find 
suited to different times and places could arise from 
nothing but the ideas and will of a Being necessarily 
existing.” This argument of Newton’s is a powerful 
one against the skepticism of the present day. We 
may also see the unreasonableness of atheistic pan- 
theism by the following considerations. The universe 
is either self-caused or created by another. If self- 
caused, it was eternal ; and if created, the first cause 
must have been eternal. Now, an eternal being must 
be a self-existent, independent, and necessary being. 


Rational Argument for a Deity. 


25 


Either the universe or its Creator must therefore 
have these characteristics. It is also plain that the 
intelligent existences in the universe must have sprung 
from intelligence, since no being can communicate 
power with which it is not possessed. Hence the 
fountain of existence must be intelligent, as well as 
necessary and eternal. Is the universe, then, intelli- 
gent, or has it originated from the intelligence of 
another? “ Matter cannot be intelligent as a whole 
without being intelligent in every atom, for a con- 
course of unintelligent atoms can never produce in- 
telligence ; but if it be intelligent in every atom, then 
we are perpetually meeting with unintelligent com- 
pounds resulting from intelligent elements. If, again, 
matter be essentially eternal, but at the same time 
essentially unintelligent, then, an intelligent prin- 
ciple being traced in the world, and even in man 
himself, we are put in possession of two coeternal 
independent principles, destitute of all relative con- 
nection and common medium of action.”* 

The doctrine of Evolution has been most indus- 
triously urged and elaborated by skeptical philoso- 
phers in modern times, and the facts of natural science 
have been arranged and classified in its support, so as 
to weaken or invalidate the idea of a special creation. 
Self-evolution, or the evolving or unfolding of the 
phenomena of the universe without extraneous power, 
is essentially a denial of the existence of God. It is 
only another phase of Pantheism. Many distinguished 
naturalists, however, contend that there is no antag- 


11* 


* Good’s Book of Nature. 


126 


Theory of Evolution. 


onism between the ideas of creation and evolution, 
claiming that creative power was exerted only at the 
beginning, and all subsequent changes resulted from 
natural laws acting without intelligent design. We 
have already shown, page 25, that according to this 
view the liberty of the Divine Mind has been alienated 
or enchained by the act of creation, and a new law, 
or order of things, introduced, which is logically fatal 
to this hypothesis. Others, who admit the general 
phenomena of evolution, maintain the immanence of 
Divine Power throughout nature, as seen in forms 
and processes specially exhibiting design. To this 
class of naturalists, teleology, or the study of those 
facts which display adaptation and design, affords a 
large field of investigation, which, notwithstanding 
the studied efforts of the other classes of evolutionists 
to ignore or repudiate, is as clearly manifest as any 
other class of facts or principles. 

Mr. Darwin is popularly considered to be the 
originator of the theory of evolution, or development 
by law, which is often referred to as “ Darwinism,” 
but it is not strictly correct. The ancient myth of 
Egypt and India of the chaotic or mundane egg from 
which all things successively emerged, and the pan- 
theistic theories referred to on page 34, show the 
prevalence of such a theory in early times. Theistic 
evolutionists see a reference to creative development 
in Ps. cxxxix. : “ My substance was not hid from thee 
when I was made in secret, and curiously wrought in 
the lowest parts of the earth. Thine eyes did see my 
substance, yet being unperfect, and in thy bool* all 


Hypotheses of various Evolutionists. 127 

my members were written, which in continuance 
were fashioned, when as yet there was none of them.” 

In modern times, Leibnitz, Kant, and Laplace 
enunciated the principles of the nebular hypothesis, 
or the evolution of the world from a gaseous or fluid 
condition, and Buffon, Wolff, Goethe, and Von Baer 
taught the transmutation of structure and form in 
plants and animals from almost structureless embryos. 
Lord Monboddo and Lamarck both suggested the 
possible origin of man from the ape. The doctrines 
of the correlation of forces in nature and of the con- 
servation or persistence of force, which have been so 
fully illustrated in the physical sciences by Rumford, 
Grove, Mayer, and Joule, have been applied to vital 
phenomena by Carpenter and others, and even to 
mind-force by Maudsley, Buchner, and most of 
modern materialists. (See page 175.) Prof. Harts- 
horrie (Art. Evolution, “Johnson’s Cyclopaedia”) 
shows that evolutionists have adopted the following 
hypotheses to account for the origin of diverse spe- 
cies : 1. Self-elevation by “appetency,” or use and 
effort: Monboddo, Lamarck, and Cope. 2. Modifica- 
tion by the surrounding conditions of the “medium:” 
St. Hilaire, Quatrefages, Draper, and Spencer. 3. 
Natural selection under the struggle for existence, 
with spontaneous variability, causing the “ survival 
of the fittest:” Darwin, Wallace, and Hackel. 4. 
Derivation by preordained succession of organic 
forms under an “innate tendency” or “internal 
force:” Owen and Mivart. 5. Evolution by “un- 
conscious intelligence:” Morel, Laycock, Murphy. 


128 


Insufficiency of Proofs of Design. 

6. Less definite, but clearly implied in the writings 
of Prof. A. Gray, Dr. McCosh, Baden Powell, the 
duke of Argyll, and others, is the view of orderly 
creation “by law ” through the immanent action and 
direction of Divine Power, or, in other words, creative 
evolution. We abridge the following reasons given 
by Prof. Hartshorne for uniting with Carpenter, 
Dana, Agassiz, Henry, Sir J. Herschel, Sir W. 
Thomson, Asa Gray, and other distinguished scien- 
tists, in denying absolutely the insufficiency of the 
proofs of design in nature, and also in refusing to 
admit the elimination of special creative action or 
direct modification of nature from all periods since 
the first origination of the universe. 

i. The “nebular hypothesis” is null without a 
creative act to produce the required “inequality of 
distribution ” of cosmic matter in space. Hackel 
admits that it is weak on two points, the heat of the 
nebular mass and its rotary motion. Herbert Spencer 
has also committed himself to a self-destructive pro- 
cess of reasoning in his “ First Principles,” as shown 
by a review in the “New Englander.” The “insta- 
bility of the homogeneous,” on which Spencer builds 
large consequences, might account for chaos, but 
never for the universe. Carried forward without de- 
signingwill-force to modify them, natural cosmic forces 
tend always to equilibration, and consequent dissolu- 
tion. The universe must thus become its own ceme- 
tery. Mivart’s special hypothesis of an “ internal force ” 
determinative of evolutionary changes in organisms 
is vague and unsatisfactory while detached from the 
“ will-force” (Wallace) of an immanent creative power. 


Variation . 


29 


2. Variation is necessary to the Darwinian or any 
other “ non-teleological” theory, and no such theory 
accounts for variation. Darwin requires also almost 
infinite variability of plants and animals; but, so far 
from infinite, observation shows it to be confined 
within very narrow, limits. The non-fertility of hy- 
brids of two nearly-allied species is a very important 
indication of the present fixedness of those limita- 
tions. Also, species do not pass in any case into 
each other. Palaeontology and recent zoology and 
botany are declared by Agassiz, Barrande, Dawson, 
Gould, Balfour, and Thomson to establish this. 

3. Were variation possible without the regulation of 
selective or directive design, a simple calculation of 
probabilities (see “ N. Brit. Rev.,” June, 1867) shows 
that a merely chaotic complication of forms must re- 
sult, the “struggle for existence ” notwithstanding. 

4. Infinite time has been proposed as affording a so- 
lution of the difficulties of natural selection. But infin- 
ite time would not alter the nature of the necessary re- 
sult ofinfinitevariations,norwould it regulate finite ones. 

5. Without design (as Mivart has shown) incipient 
structures, which become useful only when com- 
pletely developed, have no explanation at all. Further 
items of fact unexplained, apart from teleology, are, 
the opposition of the sexes in plants and animals; the 
metamorphoses of insects ; the cessation of the in- 
dividual life; and the renewal of life-progress by 
parental reproduction. “Accepting, then, with Her- 
bert Spencer, the evidence found everywhere of the 
unity of the ‘inscrutable universal power’ which is 


130 Pantheism repudiated by Reason. 

the cause of nature, there is proof also, in the mul- 
tiplicity and adjustment of the manifestations of that 
power, that it has the attributes of intelligence and 
will. Every specialization, each true elevation of 
type (which is a different thing from modification on 
the same plane of being), involves new force-expendi- 
ture. Certain factors have been added in the evolu- 
tion of nature whose origin is a “mystery” as yet 
quite unsolved by science. It is rational and philo- 
sophical, therefore, in the absence of any solution by 
secondary causation, to refer them, provisionally at 
least, to the direct creative action (whether sudden or 
gradual we cannot know) of the first cause. Such 
“ factors,” superadded from time to time in the past 
history of our globe, have been — I, life; 2, animality, 
as distinct from vegetable life; 3, mind-force, instinct, 
intelligence, ; 4, 7 ivs,i)/m or spirit (see I Cor. 
15 : 46), possessed by man alone of all creatures on 
the earth. While Theism must rest essentially upon 
evidence other and higher than that of physical sci- 
ence, it would appear that the facts of evolution tend 
to confirm and strengthen that evidence.” 

We thus see that notwithstanding the evident 
tendency of philosophic speculation towards pan- 
theism, reason repudiates it, and acknowledges the 
necessity of an eternal intelligent personal Creator. 
If the Bible had not revealed such a Being to us, the 
idea would have been a necessity of rational thought, 
without which the universe of matter and mind 
would have been an unsolved enigma. 

The Scriptures represent the Deity to us as a per- 


The Bible Representation of God. 13 1 

sonal Being, of infinite perfection and intelligence, 
supremely great, and wonderful in condescension. 
Their representations of his moral government are 
perfectly consistent with what we know of the econ- 
omy of nature, as clearly shown by Bishop Butler in 
his “Analogy;” and the ideas connected with the 
names or terms by which He is designated are the 
sublimest conceptions of the human mind. 

The first word used by the sacred writings to 
represent the Creator* is in the Hebrew Elohim, — 
the plural form of a word signifying the Almighty. 
It was natural that the idea of force or power should 
be associated with the act of creation; but the plural 
form suggests something different from a Brahminical 
or pantheistic monad developing the creation from 
itself after ages of inactivity or torpor. We catch a 
glimpse of essential plurality in the Divine nature, 
the eternal object as well as subject of Divine thought 
and affection and activity. 

This essential plurality in the mode of God’s 
existence is more fully explained in other parts of the 
Scriptures as a Trinity in Unity, — Father, Son, and 
Holy Ghost, mutually inexisting, yet holding personal 
relations with each other in a way surpassing human 
conception. The mystery of the Trinity, however, 
is not greater than that of the Divine essence, which 
is all in all, and all in every place, — embracing and 
filling all things without being identified with them; 
nor is it greater than any other truth which is too 
sublime for our limited faculties. 


* Gen. i. 1. 


132 Traces of the Trinity in Heathenism. 

The doctrine of a Trinity was known in the earliest 
ages. Moses represents the Holy Spirit as brooding 
over the waters of chaos (Gen. i. 2), and nearly all 
commentators agree that the visible appearances of 
God, recorded in the Old Testament, were manifesta- 
tions of the second person of the Trinity. In one 
remarkable passage of Genesis, the Father and the 
Son are both referred to by the name Jehovah: “The 
Lord [Jehovah] rained upon Sodom and upon Go- 
morrah brimstone and fire from the Lord [Jehovah] 
out of heaven.” Here a visible and an invisible 
Jehovah are mentioned in the same passage. 

The scriptural proofs of a Trinity in the Divine 
nature are very numerous, but it serves our present 
purpose simply to allude to this doctrine as forming 
pant of the patriarchal faith of mankind. Whether 
polytheism resulted from a corruption of this idea of 
God, or otherwise, the notion of a Trinity of some 
kind is found in many systems of mythology. The 
philosophy of Plato among the Greeks, and the 
worship of the Hindoos, Chinese, and Persians, con- 
tain plain allusions to it. The heathen triads, how- 
ever, are different from the Christian doctrine of the 
Trinity, since they only denote elements (or phases) 
of a developing process; while the biblical view is 
that of a necessary and eternal relation in the mode 
of the Divine existence, best expressed by the term 
Person,* although that term must not be understood 


* The term “ person” is used in mental science, strictly, to denote 
a spiritual being, — one having affections and will, — in contradistinc- 
tion to a thing or a brute. 


A Triunity reasonable. 


133 


in the sense of separation, as in polytheism. The 
word Triunity would perhaps better describe or 
characterize the true doctrine than the term Trinity. 

If God is eternal, He is also eternally active ; and 
all action requires an object adapted to the active 
power which is present; hence the infinite power of 
God requires an infinite object. Such an object must 
exist in Him, for if it were the world it would be 
necessarily eternal, and the existence of God would 
depend on the existence of the world, and a finite 
world is an unworthy object and could not absorb 
the infinite power of the Divine life. Hence God’s 
life and action — that is, his thoughts, will, love, and 
desires — require both a subject and an object, — 
Father and Son. But a duality is merely a distinc- 
tion without unity, an antithesis without intermediate 
link; after a trinity appears, the antithesis ceases, and 
the difference established by a duality is brought 
back to a unity (as illustrated by the triangle and the 
cube). This necessary Third (person) in God is the 
Holy Ghost, proceeding from the Father and the 
Son, and of the same essence with both.* 

No illustration can give a full apprehension of the 
real manner of the Divine existence, which must 
needs surpass all finite things and finite conceptions; 
yet, for the sake of those who imagine that distinction 
always implies separation, and that therefore a Trinity 
in Unity is a self-contradiction, we may show that 
science is not without analogies of this truth. It is 
well known to science that a beam or ray of ordinary 


12 


Kurtz’s Sacred History. 


134 


Jehovah. 


light is composed not only of the seven prismatic 
colors, but also of two rays or beams intimately 
united, and nowise differing from each other save in 
the relation of their axes, — the axis of one ray being 
at right angles to that of the other. If a ray of light 
falls upon a doubly-refracting crystal, its components 
are separated from each other, so that they may be 
analyzed. The distinction between them is thus seen 
to be one not of quality but of relationship. When 
the axes coincide, or lie in the same direction, total 
darkness is produced, — the peculiar relation of the 
component rays seeming to be essential to the sense 
of ordinary vision. Hence a scientific mind always 
contemplates ordinary light as compounded of really 
distinct rays (or vibrations), without separation, just as 
a Christian contemplates either of the Divine persons 
as comprehending the others, without separation, and 
yet without confounding them. The relation of the 
Son, as the revealer of essential Godhead, is also 
illustrated by the peculiarity of polarized light, just 
referred to. 

The second word used in the Hebrew Scriptures 
as the name of the Deity is Jehovah,* generally 
translated Lord in our English Bibles. This word 
has been said by eminent scholars to be made up of 
the past, present, and future of the verb to be , and 
seems to signify He who was, and is, and is to come. 
Others, however, consider it to be the future form, — 
Yahveh, He who will be. In Exodus, xxxiv. we have 


* Gen. ii. 4. 


Jehovah . 


135 


an extended explanation of the name Jehovah: 
“And the Lord passed by before him, and proclaimed, 
The Lord [Jehovah], The Lord God, merciful and 
gracious, long-suffering, and abundant in goodness 
and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving 
iniquity and transgression and sin, and that will by 
no means clear the guilty.” 

These words are the revealed interpretation of 
the term Jehovah. They “have been considered as 
so many attributes of the Divine nature. Commen- 
tators divide them into eleven, thus: 1. Jehovah, mrr ; 
2. bx, El, the strong or mighty God; 3. Dim, Rachum, 
the merciful Being , who is full of tenderness and 
compassion; 4. pjn, Chanun, the gracious One , — He 
whose nature is goodness itself, — the loving God; 
5. o'2X -px, Erec Apayim, long-suffering , the Being 
who, because of his goodness and tenderness, is not 
easily irritated, but suffers long and is kind ; 6. an, Rab, 
the great or mighty One ; 7. r\DX, Emeth, the Truth , or 
true One , — He alone who can neither deceive nor be 
deceived, — who is the Fountain of truth , and from 
whom all wisdom and knowledge must be derived; 
8. non nyj, Notser Chesed, the Preserver of bountiful- 
ness, — He whose beneficence never ends, keeping 
mercy for thousands of generations, — showing com- 
passion and mercy* while the world endures; 9. 
nxoni jwsn jvy xbu, Nose Avon vapesha vechataah, 
He who bears away iniquity and transgression and sin , 
— properly, the Redeemer, the Pardoner, the For - 
giver, — the Being whose prerogative alone it is to 
forgive sin and save the soul; 10. npr ib npj, Nakef 


i3 6 


God revealed to Moses. 


lo yinnakeh, the righteous Judge , who distributes 
justice with an impartial hand, — with whom no inno- 
cent person can ever be condemned; and 1 1. py npa, 
Paked Avon, etc., He who visits iniquity, He who 
punishes transgressors, and from whose justice no 
sinner can escape, — the God of retributive and vindic- 
tive justice!'* 

In the wilderness of Sinai, surrounded by naked 
hills, the types of unchanging nature and strength, 
Moses saw the vision of the burning bush, and to his 
mind was then communicated the knowledge of the 
eternal and infinite presence of God. The patriarch 
Jacob had appreciated the same truth at Bethel, and 
doubtless others were similarly impressed. The book 
of Job contains frequent allusions to the same thought. 
But to Moses the renewal of this revelation was very 
emphatic. “ I am that I am” were the words which 
fell upon his ear, and caused him to feel that God was 
personally present, that there was no such thing as 
solitude, and that every spot through the expanse of 
space was inhabited by the Almighty. The words 
he then heard are characteristic of a divinely inde- 
pendent and eternal Being, self-existent, and far re- 
moved above all creatures whatever. 

As an example of the manner in which the ancients 
were indebted to the Scriptures,* Dr. A. Clarke, in his 
comment on Ex. iii., declares that to this passage 
the Greeks owed the celebrated inscription over the 
door of the temple of Apollo at Delphi. The inscrip- 


* Dr. A. Clarke’s Com. on Ex. xxxiv. 6. 


Revelation of God to Moses. 137 

tion consisted simply of the monosyllable El, Thou art , 
the second person of the substantive verb ei/M f lam. He 
quotes Plutarch, who wrote a treatise upon the sub- 
ject of this inscription, having received the true mean- 
ing in Egypt, doubtless from the Septuagint version 
of the Bible. This philosopher observes that “ this 
title is not only proper, but peculiar to God, because 
He alone is being; for mortals have no participation 
of true being, because that which begins and ends, 
and is continually changing, is never one nor the 
same, nor in the same state. The deity on whose 
temple this word was inscribed was called Apollo, 
AxoMcuv, from a, negative, and notis, many, because 
God is one, his nature simple, his essence uncom- 
pounded.” Hence, he informs us, the ancient mode 
of addressing God was “El, ' EN , etc., Thou art one, 
for many cannot be attributed to the Divine nature, 
in which there is neither first nor last, past nor future, 
old nor young; but as being one, fills up in one now 
an eternal duration.” And he concludes with ob- 
serving that “ this word corresponds to certain others 
on the same temple, viz., ENQSl EEATTON , Knoiv thy- 
self; as if, under the name El, Thou art, the Deity de- 
signed to excite men to venerate Him as eternally 
existing, and to put them in mind of the frailty and 
mortality of their own nature.” 

In the opening verses of Genesis, Moses “ makes 
us spectators of the birth of created nature. He calls 
up to our imaginations a season in the distant depths 
of a past eternity, when the assemblage of stars and 
of systems which strew the fields of space did not 
12* 


138 


The Pentateuch. 


exist ; when no glorious or undying spirit, angelic or 
human, lived to comprehend the God that had given 
them being. Nothing ever broke that wondrous 
silence, save the voice of the Eternal One, who ex- 
isted from the unfathomable depths of eternity. God 
was there then, as now, in three Persons, — the ever- 
blessed Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. But the uni- 
verse held only God, and in that Divine Being was 
Ihe attribute of benevolence, and that benevolence 
craved the being girt round by dependent creatures. 
It seemed not good to God to continue alone ; the 
sublime loneliness was infringed ; the word was 
spoken, and the depths of space became strewed 
with worlds ; and immortal spirits, sparklings of his 
infinity, thronged his presence. ‘The morning stars 
sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for 
joy.’ Such is the conception of the Divine Being 
which Moses has presented to us.”* 

The Pentateuch also exhibits to us the personal 
agency of God in the natural and moral government 
of the world ; the care of the Creator for the work 
of his hands ; the constant supervision of his provi- 
dence, not only in conserving the general order of the 
universe, but also in the ordinary and daily affairs of 
life; his intervention for the overthrow of wickedness, 
and the preservation of his people. 

The books of Job and Genesis show that such ideas 
prevailed during the patriarchal age. Such views of 
God and his government were a rich heritage forpri- 


* Farrar’s Science in Theology. 


God as revealed in the Psalms. 


139 


meval man. It is a sad commentary on human de- 
pravity that so many nations did not like to retain 
God in their knowledge, “ neither were thankful ; but 
became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish 
heart was darkened. Professing themselves to be 
wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the 
uncorruptible God into an image made like to corrup- 
tible man, and to birds, and four-footed beasts, and 
creeping things.” This was the natural consequence 
of that infidelity which ignores the supernatural. 

The subsequent revelations of God in the Old Tes- 
tament were of similar character to those made to 
the patriarchs and to Moses. The Psalmist speaks 
of his immeasurable greatness and of his real pres- 
ence to the heart of the praying worshiper: “When 
I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the 
moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained ; what 
is man, that thou art mindful of him? and the son of 
man, that thou visitest him ?” Again, “Whither shall 
I go from thy spirit? or whither shall I flee from thy 
presence? If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there ; 
if I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art there. If 
I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the 
uttermost parts of the sea; even there shall thy hand 
lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me. If I say, 
Surely the darkness shall cover me; even the night 
shall be light about me. Yea, the darkness hideth not 
from thee; but the night shineth as the day: the dark- 
ness and the light are both alike to thee.” St. Au- 
gustine’s description of God’s omnipresence, although 
very forcible, adds nothing to the teaching of this 


140 


New Testame?it Revelation of God. 


passage: “ Yet mean I not by thy filling of all things, 
that they contain thee, but rather that thou containest 
them. Neither fillest thou all things by parcels, 
neither is it in any wise to be thought that each thing 
receiveth thee according to the proportion of its own 
size; that is to say, the greatest things more, and the 
smallest things less : but rather that thou thyself art 
whole in all things, and all things in thee ; whose al- 
mightiness incloseth all things, and no man can find 
any escape from thy power, for he that hath not thy 
favor shall never escape thy displeasure.” 

In the prophetical books w r e have the same repre- 
sentations of the Divine greatness and of the Divine 
condescension. As the fullness of time comes on, 
the promises of Divine mercy become clearer, so that 
we meet with such passages as “Thus saith the high 
and lofty One that inhabiteth eternity, whose name is 
Holy; I dwell in the high and holy place, with him 
also that is of a contrite and humble spirit, to revive 
the spirit of the humble, and to revive the heart of 
the contrite ones.” 

It is in the New Testament, however, that we have 
the fullest revelation of the mercy and condescen- 
sion of God. The incarnation of God the Son is the 
crowning proof of his regard for us. The infinite 
greatness and amazing power of God might deter us * 
from approaching Him, might produce misgiving 
whether He would deign to notice such unworthy 
beings as we are. But the Word . made flesh is a 
pledge that our human nature is not beneath his 
notice and his love. 


Summary of the Divine Character. 


141 

The incarnation has been the hope of the world 
from the earliest ages, and the memory of that hope 
has been kept alive by many a legend and mytho- 
logical fable in the various idolatries of the world ; 
and it is certainly no more unsuitable, derogatory, or 
dishonorable for the Divine nature to unite itself with 
our humanity, than for God to give proofs of his own 
glorious attributes in the meanest of his works, to 
connect himself with them, and in and through them 
to exert his power and agency; nor is the one kind 
of manifestation really more mysterious than the 
other. 

In the New Testament we are plainly taught that 
this world is not a God-forsaken world. God has 
loved us even when we were dead in sins. Herein is 
love, that God hath sent his Son to be the propitiation 
for our sins. “ The deep necessity of humanity for 
an inner and personal union and mediation with the 
eternal Godhead, which pervades all heathenism, and 
seeks to satisfy itself without* the clear light of reve- 
lation, in dark dreams and insane invisible fancies, is 
satisfied only in a pure Christianity, genuine and 
worthy of God.”* 

In the moral excellence of Christ’s character, as 
well as in the nature of his person and the signifi- 
cance of his work, we are taught what God is. Christ 
was “ the brightness of his Father’s glory, and the 
express image of his person.” Christianity shows that 
the highest glory of God is not his majesty and 


* Sartorius. 


142 Consistency of these Views with Science. 

power, nor his mysterious infinitude, but his wondrous 
love, which brings “ peace on eartli and good will to 
men.” For this was Christ manifested on earth; and, 
although ascended to heaven, our mediator is Jesus 
still, — our elder brother, — and sends his Spirit, as 
“ another Comforter,” to dwell in the hearts of the 
penitent and faithful, to direct and sanctify and save 
them. 

These scriptural views of the Divine Being teach 
that God is a personal Being, of infinite greatness, 
and of infinite condescension also; that He is of un- 
limited intelligence and power, and of wondrous love 
also ; that He is not only all in all, but all in every 
place, — as perfect in an atom as in a universe, and no 
more bounded by a universe than by an atom ; that 
while He fills immensity, He has a personal care 
over the minutest and meanest of his works ; that all 
the beings and forces in the universe are subject to 
his will, while He is subject only to the essential 
Holiness and Wisdom gf his own nature. 

Are these views consistent with the discoveries 
of modern science ? Can we find evidences of vast 
power and majesty combined with intelligent de- 
sign, in the universe around us? And have we 
equal evidence of condescension in the works of 
creation? If this be so, the Bible teaches the truth 
relating to God; but if it be otherwise, — if there be 
evidence of irregularity and weakness, or a want of 
care for minutiae, — then the Bible is inconsistent with 
the book of Nature. 

The evidences of intelligent skill combined with 


Sptctrum Analysis. 


143 


majesty and power multiply with every effort of the 
human mind to penetrate and comprehend the uni- 
verse. The discoveries of Sir W. Hersc'hel and others 
have shown that the fixed stars visible to the eye 
or telescope are suns similar to our own, having in 
all probability planets revolving around them, as in 
our own solar system. These suns, in such vast 
multitudes as to be literally innumerable, and at such 
enormous distances that the light of many of them 
takes centuries to reach the earth, are but parts of 
a single cluster, or system, bound by the same tie 
of gravity and illustrating the same harmony and 
design which we witness in those parts of the uni- 
verse which are near us. But far beyond this system 
of the fixed stars, divided from our firmament and 
each other by measureless intervals, numerous firma- 
ments, glorious as ours, float through immensity; 
doubtless forming one stupendous system, bound 
together by fine relationships. Recently science has 
interrogated the light from these distant suns, — the 
spectrum analysis has interpreted its strange hiero- 
glyphics, — and the message it has borne to our 
minds is that these distant spheres are formed of 
the same materials and combined by the same laws 
as our own world, although exhibiting that same 
variety which everywhere characterizes the work of 
the Supreme Intelligence. Yet these countless suns 
which blaze around us, “leading forth their countless 
worlds,” are not the universe. Every increase in the 
space-penetrating power of our telescopes brings to 
view other and more distant stars and nebulee, show* 


144 


Microscopic View . 


in g us that far beyond the sphere of our vision or 
the reach of our instruments, Infinity, boundless 
Infinity, stretches unfathomed as ever. Surely in 
view of such disclosures the revelation of the Bible 
receives additional emphasis : “ Who is like unto the 
Lord our God, who dwelleth on high, who hum- 
bleth himself to behold the things that are in heaven, 
and in the earth!” Thus, as Sartorius well says, 
“ the splendid exposition of the stars teaches us to 
recognize from the whole book of Nature the same 
God of power and majesty which the Bible reveals.” 

But does the Creator care for the things “ in the 
earth”? What does science teach us of the minutiae 
of creation ? Simply this, that the perfection of the 
Great First Cause is seen equally in an atom as in the 
universe. If the telescope has revealed an infinitude 
above us, the microscope has revealed an infinitude 
below us. In the language of Lavater, “ Every grain 
of sand is an immensity, every leaf a world.” 

When we consider the myriads of living beings 
exhibited to the scientific eye, so small that thousands 
of them can swim in a single drop of water, each of 
them having organs well adapted to its various ne- 
cessities, how can we help exclaiming, “ Great and 
marvelous are thy works, Lord God Almighty; in 
wisdom hast thou made them all”? and how can we 
help realizing that the scriptural declarations respect- 
ing the condescension of God are in strict accordance 
with scientific truth? We inquire of the telescope 
and the spectrum analysis, and they testify to unity 
of design in the midst of most amazing manifestations 


Practical Effect of stick Views. 145 

of power and majesty and wisdom, thereby proving 
the entire visible universe to be under the control and 
dominion of the same Intelligence, and confirming 
those representations of Scripture which assure us 
that God is great and immeasurable, who measures 
the heavens with a span, and before whom the nations 
of the earth are as nothing, and all the people as the 
drop of a bucket, and as the dust which lies in the 
balance. 

We ask the microscope, and it reveals a thousand 
contrivances of infinite skill in mechanism, so small 
as to be invisible to the unaided vision. It shows us 
the first beginnings of organic life, and the marvelous 
provision made for the performance of all the func- 
tions of living beings, however minute. As every 
addition to the perfection of the telescope enlarges 
our ideas of the Divine majesty and of infinite power, 
so every increase of optical skill applied to the mi- 
croscope reveals an infinity in the descending scale, 
— an infinity of minuteness and condescension and 
providence. 

The practical effect of such views of the Divine 
Being is important to morality. For the good order- 
ing of human life they are infinitely above all the 
speculations and theories of philosophy, falsely so 
called. The thought that the infinite and all-wise 
God is ever near us will encourage us in virtue and 
deter us from vice. There is no lonely spot in the 
universe where He is not present. There is no tear 
which He sees not, no pang which He notes not, and 
no prayer which He hears not. There is no crime, 
13 


146 Practical Effect of such Views. 

also, which He is not aware of. He attends to all our 
projects. He compasses our path and our lying down, 
and is acquainted with all our ways. God is our ever- 
present Father, and holds the helm of the universe, as 
a living, thinking, loving person. Such views infuse 
strength, and give a vigor to human character which 
is impossible without them. When Mungo Park was 
separated from his companions and was lost in the 
desert, — when, weary and faint at heart, he lay down 
under the shadow of a rock to die, — it was not 
the mystery and majesty of the Almighty, as seen 
in the vast, ocean-like expanse of the desert, which 
infused new strength into his soul ; but, observing a 
delicate flower in the crevice of the rock, he called 
to mind the care and providence of an ever-present 
Deity, and was encouraged to make the effort which re- 
sulted in his deliverance. So when our Saviour would 
teach us true confidence in God, He does not remind 
us of his vast dominion, but tells us of sparrows and 
flowers, and asks, “Are ye not much better than 
they ? . . . Wherefore, if God so clothe the grass of 
the field, which to-day is, and to-morrow is cast into 
the oven, shall He not much more clothe you, O 
ye of little faith ?” 


CHAPTER VI. 

THE CREATION. 


“ These are the generations of the heavens and of the earth when they 
were created, in the day that the Lord God made the earth and the 
heavens.” 

Gen. ii. 4. 


(M7) 


CONTENTS. 


The Biblical Cosmogony most rational of all Antiquity — Not confined 
to Genesis — Object of Geology — The Rosetta Stone — Geologic 
Theories not settled — Testimonies of Guyot, Silliman, Buckland, 
Balfour, Cuvier, Lyell, Brewster, Agassiz, and Humboldt — Excep- 
tions to Invariable Law a Proof of Personal Will — Change, and 
not Invariability, taught by Science — Geologic History of the Earth, 
and its Consistency with the Scriptures — Geology a Science of 
Beginnings, and of Creation by Successive Fiats — Refutes the 
Chief Objection against Miracles — Presents Analogies confirmatory 
of Scripture Prophecy — Our Relations to God more important than 
Curiosities of History. 


CHAPTER VI. 


THE CREATION. 

The scriptural account of creation is simply a brief 
outline, given in general language, such as adapts 
itself to men of every age and in every stage of in- 
tellectual development. Some of this language is pic- 
torial, or metaphorical, and other parts are literal and 
historical. Its evident design was the annunciation 
of certain principles and facts as preliminary to the 
religious history of the Israelites, and the unfolding 
of the Divine intention respecting human redemption. 
Its brevity and mixed style render it difficult to inter- 
pret as to minute particulars ; nor is it necessary to 
the design of the Scriptures that it should be so 
interpreted. 

Brief as it is, the biblical history of the creation 
was for centuries the plainest, most rational, and most 
consistent known to mankind. The creation of the 
world out of nothing by the power of God, its globu- 
lar form and suspension in space, and its gradual 
preparation as a habitation for man, were clearly 
taught by the Bible when all the ancient philosophies 
and systems of heathenism were full of the crudest 
and most absurd theories. Thus, in Greek and Latin 
philosophy the heavens were considered a solid 
13 * ( 149 ) 


Ancient Cosmic at Systems. 


150 

vault, studded with stars; and to account for the 
motion of the planets, men fancied that there existed 
a strange machinery of cycles and epicycles. Plato 
held that the world was an intelligent being, and 
Xenophanes taught that God and the world were the 
same thing. In the Hindoo philosophy the world is 
represented as flat and triangular, composed of several 
stories, the whole mass sustained upon the heads of 
elephants, who in turn are supported by a huge tor- 
toise. Mohammed taught that the mountains were 
created to prevent the earth from moving, and to 
hold it as by anchors and chains. Even the Fathers 
of the church, as they are called, neglecting the study 
of the Scriptures for the speculations of the old 
philosophers, taught doctrines scarcely less absurd; 
and Galileo was condemned by the Inquisition for 
teaching the motion of the earth. But as the truths 
of natural science have been developed by experi- 
ments and observation, and rational views of creation 
have been established, they have been found consistent 
with, and often anticipated by, the language of Holy 
Writ. 

The beginning of the book of Genesis is not the 
only part of Scripture descriptive of the creation of 
the world, and in interpreting the opening chapters 
it is necessary to compare them with other accounts 
and allusions in order to understand their real mean- 
ing. Thus, for instance, in the book of Job, acknowl- 
edged to be one of the oldest in the Bible, and which 
contains a fuller account of the patriarchal faith than 
any other, we read, “Where wast thou when I laid 


Teachings of Geology. 15 x 

the foundations of the earth? declare, if thou hast 
understanding. Who hath laid the measures thereof, 
if thou knovvest? or who hath stretched the line upon 
it? Whereupon are the foundations thereof fastened? 
or who laid the corner-stone thereof; when the morn- 
ing stars sang together, and all the sons of God 
shouted for joy?” This language is full of Oriental 
metaphor, but it must have had its foundation in 
patriarchal ideas respecting creation. The entire 
passage, and especially the phrase, “ Who hath laid 
the measures thereof?” implies an opinion that it 
was gradually formed, if indeed the discovery of the 
earth’s strata was not anticipated. The passage also 
suggests that the arrangement of the earth was not 
the first of God’s creative acts, but that when the 
foundations of the earth were laid, “the morning 
stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted 
for joy;” showing that there were intelligent inhab- 
itants of other worlds, who were interested spectators 
of the birth of our planet. 

The science of geology investigates the earth’s 
crust, and considers its various changes. It has 
brought to light remains of extinct animals and 
vegetables, some of them of strange forms and of gi- 
gantic size, entombed in the rocky strata of the earth. 
From the time of Cuvier, who first studied these fos- 
sil remains in the gypsum quarries of Paris, to the 
present, this science has been assiduously prosecuted, 
and the leaves of the great stone book of Nature 
turned over in search of information. All over these 
pages are strange hieroglyphics, — pictures of plants 


152 Eminent Geologists not skeptical. 

and reptiles and birds and beasts, which record the 
story of their birth and of their overthrow, often in 
minute particulars. 

The gradual unfolding of these facts was witnessed 
on the one hand by weak-minded theologians with 
dread, lest the foundations of Scripture faith should 
be overturned, — as if Nature, properly interpreted, 
could ever contradict God’s word ! — and on the other 
hand was prematurely hailed by half-educated infidels 
as a contribution to their cause. The great masters 
of science and humble Christians remained unmoved, 
being fully persuaded that “the word of the Lord 
endureth forever.” While infidelity claimed that the 
testimony of the rocks disagreed with the biblical 
account, and urged that the so-called “ law of devel- 
opment” was the true order of nature, by which man 
and all the tribes of animated being have risen from 
more primitive types and atoms, the discoverers and 
leaders of modern science could find no such dis- 
agreement and no such conclusions. Notwithstand- 
ing the published opinions of such men, however, we 
frequently find in current, and especially newspaper, 
literature, their names associated with sentiments of 
atheistic tendency, as if they had given the weight of 
their influence on the side of infidelity. To such low 
arts do the votaries of skepticism resort. We quote 
a few of the testimonies published by such men as 
science delights to honor, and then examine the teach- 
ing of geology respecting the creation of the earth, 
and its consistency with Scripture. 

During the French campaign in Egypt, the troops 


The Rosetta Stone. 


153 


stationed at Rosetta dug up a mutilated block of 
basalt, containing inscriptions in three characters, 
arranged in parallel columns. One of these columns 
consisted of figures of animals and birds and imple- 
ments, like the hieroglyphics which cover the Egyp- 
tian monuments. Another column was in Greek 
characters, and contained a decree of Ptolemy Epiph- 
anes, which concluded with these words: “This 
decree shall be engraved on a hard stone, in sacred, 
common, and Greek characters.” The third column 
was in Coptic. The fortune of war carried this stone 
to the British Museum, where it attracted great at- 
tention from learned antiquaries, and from it, after 
much labor and research, the celebrated Champollion 
obtained the key to the hieroglyphics of ancient 
Egypt, by which the history of that country has 
been so largely explored. That Rosetta stone, con- 
taining the same record in various characters, may 
well represent the account of creation given in the 
Scriptures and sealed up in the rocky strata of the 
earth’s crust, and the difficulties found in the inter- 
pretation of the hieroglyphics may warn us against 
hasty conclusions respecting the other. If the guesses 
of linguists and antiquaries were crude and false 
until Champollion discovered the true method of 
interpretation, we need not expect the true rendering 
of geology and the Scriptures to be more easy, 
especially when we remember that the hieroglyphics 
in the rocks are an extended commentary upon, 
rather than a copy of, the brief record of the Bible. 
The difficulty is not so much in the scriptural account 


1 54 Professor Guy of s Testimony . 

as in the more extended field of geology. This latter 
science is comparatively young, yet its hypothesis 
of creation has been changed several times already 
to meet the demands of maturer research. The 
Neptunian and Plutonian theories, as they were called, 
struggled hard for the mastery, but at length a com- 
promise was effected, and geologists acceded to the 
view that the crystalline strata of the earth’s crust 
were of igneous origin, and the rest were sediment- 
ary. The recent discovery of fossil remains of ani- 
mal life (the Eozoon) in the Laurentian granite or 
gneiss bids fair, however, to necessitate another and 
different arrangement of geological deductions. The 
tendency also appears in some eminent geologists to 
regard the elevation of the mountains as the result 
of subsidence rather than upheaval. Such changes 
should teach us caution, and prevent us from con- 
sidering the scientific views of any age an absolute 
standard of truth. 

With regard to the agreement of geology and 
Scripture, Professor Guyot, one of the most distin- 
guished physical geographers of the present day, re- 
marks, “ To a sincere and unsophisticated mind, it 
must be evident that the grand outlines sketched by 
Moses are the same as those which modern science 
enables us to trace; however imperfect and unsettled 
the details furnished by scientific inquiries may ap- 
pear on many points. Whatever changes we may 
expect to be introduced by new discoveries, in our 
present view of the universe and the globe, the promi- 
nent points of this vast picture will remain. And 


Prof. Silliman on the Word “ Day” 1 5 5 

these only are traced out in this admirable account 
of Genesis. These outlines were sufficient for the 
moral purposes of the book ; the scientific details are 
for us patiently to investigate. They were no doubt 
unknown to Moses, as the details of the life and work 
of the Saviour were unknown to the great prophets 
who announced his coming and traced out with 
master-hand his character and objects centuries be- 
fore his appearance on earth. But the same Divine 
hand which lifted up before the eyes of Daniel and of 
Isaiah the veil which covered the tableau of the time 
to come, unveiled before the eyes of the author of 
Genesis the earliest ages of the creation. And Moses 
was the prophet of the past, as Daniel, and Isaiah, and 
many others, were the prophets of the future.” 

Professor Silliman finds it easy to reconcile all the 
teachings of geology with the account in Genesis, by 
regarding the term “ day,” as used in a popular sense, 
to represent a period of time. He says, in his lec- 
ture before the Smithsonian Institute, “The allusion 
in the Commandments and in other parts of the Scrip- 
tures to the six days would, of course, be made in 
conformity with the language adopted in the narra- 
tive, which, being for the masses of mankind, was 
necessarily a popular history, although of Divine 
origin ; and the historian adopted a division of time 
that was in general use, although, as to half the time 
at least, it was inconsistent with astronomical laws. 
Extension of the time so as to cover the events by 
the operation of physical laws removes every diffi- 
culty, and interferes with no doctrine of religion.” 


156 Prof Balfour on Botanical Species. 

Dr. Buckland, referring to the timidity or prejudice 
which once existed against geology, says, “ The alarm 
which was excited by its first discoveries has well- 
nigh passed away ; and those to whom it has been 
permitted to be the humble instruments of their pro- 
mulgation, and who have steadily persevered, under 
the firm conviction that ‘ truth can never be opposed 
to truth,’ and that the works of God, when rightly 
understood, and viewed in their true relations and 
from a right position, would at length be found to be 
in perfect accordance with his word, are now receiv- 
ing their high reward in finding difficulties vanish, 
objections gradually withdrawn, and in seeing the 
evidences of geology admitted into the list of wit- 
nesses to the truth of the great fundamental doctrines 
of Christianity.” 

Similar testimonies are given by the highest scien- 
tific authorities, in reference to the notion of the 
development of one species of beings into another of 
a higher type. Professor Balfour, an eminent botani- 
cal writer, says, “ There are no doubt differences in 
the individuals of a species, depending on soil, and on 
different conditions of heat, light, and moisture. But 
these differences are not incompatible with the idea 
of a common origin ; and, moreover, we find that 
there is always a tendency to return to type. In 
illustration of this statement, we may refer to ordi- 
nary vegetables, such as cabbage, cauliflower, broccoli, 
etc. This plant (the Brassica) grows wild on our 
sea-shores in certain places, and when cultivated it 
assumes peculiar forms. Thus it forms a heart, as in 


Cuvier on the Development Hypothesis. 157 

ordinary cabbage; its flower-stalks become thickened 
or shortened, as in cauliflower or broccoli ; or its cel- 
lular tissue is largely developed, so as to give rise to 
the curled appearance of greens. These varieties are 
continued by cultivation ; and after a series of genera- 
tions, the seeds of the varieties propagate, more or 
less completely, plants of a similar nature. But if 
they are allowed to grow wild, then in the progress 
of time the variations disappear, and the original type 
of the species is reverted to. The varieties of apples 
and pears are continued by the art of horticulture and 
the process of grafting ; but the seeds of these plants, 
when allowed to grow wild, produce the original 
stock, viz., the crab-apple or crab-pear, whence all the 
varieties have been produced. All these facts show 
the permanency of species in nature, and contradict 
the crude ideas of those so-called naturalists who 
state that one species can be transmuted into another 
in the course of generations.” 

Cuvier asks, “ Why, if such transformations have 
occurred, do not the bowels of the earth preserve the 
records of such a curious genealogy ?” 

Lyell gives it as the result of careful inquiry, 
“ That species have a real existence in nature, and 
that each was endowed at the time of its creation 
with the attributes and organs by which it is dis- 
tinguished.” 

Sir Charles Bell says, “ Everything declares the 
species to have its origin in a distinct creation, not in a 
gradual variation from some original type.” 

Sir David Brewster argues at length against the 

14 


158 Brewster on Natural Selection . 

speculations of Darwin, and his theory of “natural 
selection.” He says, “ Naturalists of high authority 
have followed Mr. Darwin through all his argu- 
ments, and have shown in the clearest manner that 
his theory is inconsistent with the very facts upon 
which he has rested it.” He also declares that “in 
the fossil remains of the pre-Adamite ages there is 
not the slightest proof of any variations in the suc- 
cessive inhabitants of the earth. Mr. Darwin him- 
self admits, to use his own words, ‘ that this is the 
most obvious and grave objection to his theory/ 
but yet conjectures that rocks still undiscovered, 
and myriads of ages older than the Cambrian or 
azoic strata, may still bear testimony to his views. 
When such strata with such indications are dis- 
covered, when the instinct of the elephant shall 
have expanded into reason, and the chatter of the 
parrot have its climax in speech, we may then claim 
kindred with the brutes that perish.” 

There has been an attempt of late, in certain 
quarters, to drag the names of Agassiz and Hum- 
boldt into the support of skeptical theories of crea- 
tion and against the Bible; but the dishonesty of 
such efforts will be evident from the following quo- 
tations. 

In his “ Methods of Study in Natural History,” 
Agassiz says, “ It is my belief that naturalists are 
chasing a phantom in their search after some ma- 
terial gradation among created beings, by which the 
whole animal kingdom may have been derived by 
successive development from a single germ, or from 


Prof. Agassiz on Development. 


159 


a few germs. It would seem, from the frequency 
with which this notion is revived, — ever returning 
upon us with hydra-headed tenacity of life, and pre- 
senting itself under a new form as soon as the pre- 
ceding one has been exploded and set aside, — that 
it has a certain fascination for the human mind. 
This arises, perhaps, from the desire to explain the 
secret of our own existence; to have some simple 
and easy solution of the fact that we live. I confess 
that there seems to me to be a repulsive poverty in 
this material explanation, that is contradicted by the 
intellectual grandeur of the universe : the resources 
of the Deity cannot be so meagre that, in order to 
create a human being endowed with reason, He must 
change a monkey into a man. ... I nevertheless 
insist that this theory is opposed to the processes of 
Nature, as far as we have been able to apprehend 
them ; that it is contradicted by the facts of embry- 
ology and paleontology, the former showing us norms 
of development as distinct and persistent for each 
group as are the fossil types of each period revealed 
to us by the latter; and that the experiments upon 
domesticated animals and cultivated plants, on which 
its adherents base their views, are entirely foreign to 
the matter in hand, since the varieties thus brought 
about by the fostering care of man are of an entirely 
different character from those observed among wild 
species. And while their positive evidence is inap- 
plicable, their negative evidence is equally unsatis- 
factory, since, however long and frequent the breaks 
in the geological series may be in which they would 


160 Humboldt's “ Cosmos" not infidel. 

fain bury their transition types, there are many points 
in the succession where the connection is perfectly 
distinct and unbroken, and it is just at these points 
that new organic groups are introduced without any 
intermediate forms to link them with the preceding 
ones.” 

Again he says, “ I cannot repeat too emphatically 
that there is not a single fact in embryology to jus- 
tify the assumption that the laws of development, 
now known to be so precise and definite for every 
animal, have ever been less so, or have ever been 
allowed to run into each other. The philosopher’s 
stone is no more to be found in the organic than the 
inorganic world ; and we shall seek as vainly to trans- 
form the lower animal types into the higher ones by 
any of our theories, as did the alchemists of old to 
change the baser metals into gold. . . . Classification, 
rightly understood, means simply the creative plan of 
God, as expressed in organic forms. . . . Breeds among 
animals are the work of man ; species were created 
by God.” 

With respect to Humboldt, we have already, in 
Chapter III., quoted from the “Cosmos” his opinion 
as to the common origin of mankind. To this it suf- 
fices to add the following. Speaking of the idea of a 
Cosmos, he says, “We may here trace the revelation 
of a bond of union linking together the visible world 
and that higher spiritual world which escapes the 
grasp of the senses.” Again, he quotes approvingly 
a passage from his brother Wilhelm von Humboldt, 
referring to the bond of humanity, in which he says, 


Exceptions to Law . 


161 


“It was Christianity which first promulgated the truth 
of its exalted charity, although the seed sown yielded 
but a slow and scanty harvest. Before the religion 
of. Christ manifested its form, its existence was only 
revealed by a faint foreshadowing presentiment.” He 
also devotes several pages to eulogy of the noble 
descriptions of nature in the Old Testament, in the 
most eloquent language of a true believer. 

We thus see that in the opinion of the best geolo- 
gists and naturalists there appears no discrepancy 
between the teaching of nature and of the Bible re- 
specting creation. It remains now for us to trace the 
parallelism with reference to details. 

Those skeptical philosophers who reject the biblical 
account of creation are influenced by metaphysical 
ideas of the nature of “ law,” meaning by this term 
not a mode of being or an order of sequence, but 
an invariable order in the economy and framework of 
nature, which they claim to have been from all eter- 
nity. The question is simply one of invariable ne- 
cessity, or fate, against free will. Sir Isaac Newton 
(Chapter V.) repudiated the idea that blind metaphys- 
ical necessity could produce any variety, and regarded 
the diversity of natural phenomena as a proof of the 
ideas and will of a personal Creator ; and such will 
be the conclusion of every thoughtful and candid 
student. For, while the general order and regularity 
of the universe are undeniable, exceptions enough 
occur, even in the sphere of natural science, to say 
nothing of Scripture teaching, to show the interference 
and supreme control of personal will. 


1 62 Variations from General Laws. 

The following examples afford illustrations of such 
exceptions. The various densities of the sun and 
planets follow no regular order, like that of theh 
revolutions and distances ; for while the Earth, Venus, 
and Mars have nearly the same density, Mercury is 
to the Earth as 140 is to I. Jupiter is as *24, Saturn 
as ’i 3, Her^chel as *17, and Neptune as 'i8 to 1, 
compared with the Earth. The motions of the planets 
are, as a general rule, from west to east, in elliptical 
orbits, and in nearly the same plane as the orbit of 
the Earth ; but the satellites of Herschel, and per- 
haps of Neptune, move in a retrograde direction, or 
from east to west, in circular orbits, nearly perpen- 
dicular to the Earth’s orbit. The motions of comets 
present the greatest variety possible with the influence 
of gravity, moving in parabolas, hyperbolas, and ellip- 
ses of all degrees of elongation and at all angles of 
inclination to the ecliptic. A single instance more of 
divergence from general physical laws will suffice : 
“ Perhaps the only real exception to the general law 
of bodies dilating by heat, and contracting in propor- 
tion as they are cooled, occurs in the case of water. 
If this fluid be heated to its boiling-point, it will ex- 
pand like other liquids ; and if then it be allowed to 
cool, it will be found to contract in bulk steadily until 
it attains the temperature of 40° F., at which point it 
will attain its maximum of density. On continuing 
to diminish its temperature, the water will commence 
dilating in bulk until it attains the freezing-point, or 
32 0 F., and if it be cooled below this point without 
freezing, by avoiding all agitation, it will still continue 


' Nature not invariable. 


i6 3 


to expand.”* “ In the act of freezing, a more marked 
amount of dilatation occurs ; the bursting of water- 
pipes in winter from this cause is a phenomenon familiar 
to every one.”f The great importance of this ex- 
ception will be evident when we reflect upon the con 
sequences which would otherwise ensue. The ice ot 
our rivers and lakes would sink to the bottom; layer 
after layer would be formed and sink, forming a 
frozen mass which no summer’s sun could melt; 
“ but, by the ordinances of Infinite Wisdom, it has 
been ordained that water should expand instead of 
contracting below the temperature of 40°, and the 
sheet of ice once formed, being lighter than water, 
floats on its surface instead of sinking, and thus helps 
to protect the fluid below from the further influence 
of cold.”J 

It seems plainly impossible to account for such 
variations from the general order of things — and their 
number is great — by any scheme of necessity what- 
ever. The hand of an Intelligent Personal Will is 
clearly seen in all. Further, it is plainly taught by 
physical science that the original order impressed on 
each part of nature is not invariable, so that the idea 
of “immutable laws of nature” is a figment of the 
metaphysical brain, without corroboration in nature 
itself. Our truest confidence is not in necessity and 
destiny and immutable law, but in the holiness and 
wisdom of a personal Creator, who arranges and 


* Elements of Natural Philosophy, by Dr. Golding Bird, 
f Ibid. t Ibid. 


164 


Geologic Testimony. 


adapts his universe to the needs of his moral gov- 
ernment. The subordination of nature to moral law 
is seen everywhere. Vast and mysterious changes 
occur in the universe. Suns burn up in the firma- 
ment before our eyes. Planets burst asunder into 
fragments. The moon gives evidence of volcanic 
and disruptive force. Everywhere in the universe 
we find denials of the fanciful and infidel notion of 
creation evolving by gradual development. Every- 
where we see evidences of change and convulsion and 
rearrangement, and, although we may not always per- 
ceive the design, the hand of an intelligent Designer 
is plainly manifest. 

Geology, as well as other branches of science, 
bears testimony to these truths. It shows us that by 
many revolutions the earth has been prepared to be 
the abode of numerous races, the only proof of whose 
existence is imbedded in the solid rock. The appear- 
ance of the earth’s crust is that of a succession of 
ruined worlds. The existence of man has been of 
comparatively short duration. Preceding his creation 
the earth was fitted for the habitation of giant mon- 
sters, whose description, but for the demonstrations 
of science, would comport more with the fables of 
fairy-land than with actual reality. In ages anterior 
to these, a gigantic and luxuriant vegetation flourished 
in a tropical climate, and formed the origin of our 
beds of coal. Still further back in the history of past 
eternity, a wide-spread sea covered the greater part 
of the world, full of strange fishes, high in the 
scale of organic life, as well as of simpler forms of 


Geology and Sacred Scriptures reconciled. 165 

animated existence. From this point we seem to 
lose the last vestige of life, and enter a desert and 
dreary region, which stands as a barrier to our 
researches. 

How are we to reconcile the geologic history of 
the globe with the simple account of creation given 
in the first chapter of Genesis? The answer to this 
question will not be difficult when we remember that 
it was not the object of the Bible to teach the natural 
history of the world, but the history of man’s re- 
demption. The announcement of the creation of 
mankind, and an account of the events immediately 
preparatory to man’s creation, in brief and general 
terms, was sufficient for its design. It declares, there- 
fore, in language at once accurate and sublime, that 
"In the beginning God created the heavens and the 
earth.” Passing over all the convulsions of past his- 
tory as irrelevant, it refers to the condition of the earth 
at the period preceding man’s history: “And the earth 
was without form, and void; and darkness was upon 
the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved 
upon the face of the waters.” The words translated 
“without form, and void,” may be rendered “empti- 
ness and confusion.” Either rendering, however, 
points to the wreck of a former state. From the gen- 
eral tenor of Scripture we are warranted in saying that 
God makes nothing originally “without form, and 
void.” What comes from his forming hand is per- 
fectly adapted for its use. The confusion and dis- 
order, therefore, of what we term chaos, point to an 
overturning of a former condition of things. Thus 


1 66 Term “Day” indefinite. 

the Bible history affords room for all the geological 
changes, however vast in nature or duration. 

After this brief reference to past convulsions, the 
Bible describes the preparation and furnishing of the 
earth for man’s abode as a gradual process, during six 
days, on the last of which man was created. These 
days were not such days as ours, of twenty-four hours’ 
length, as is evident from Gen. ii. 4, where all six days 
are called “ one day,” and “ generations,” also. The 
word “ day” is used in Scripture with great latitude 
of meaning, just as it is used in common language, 
as when we speak of “ our own day,” instead of “ our 
own age.” Thus, we read, “ Our days on the earth are 
as a shadow, and there is none abiding.” “ Turn from 
him, that he may rest, till he shall accomplish, as an 
hireling, his day.” “ One day is with the Lord as a 
thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.” 
The word “ day,” as used in popular language among 
ourselves, is generally restricted to express the diurnal 
revolution of the earth on its axis. Sometimes, how- 
ever, we mean by it the time during which one-half 
of the earth’s surface is presented to the sun. Thus 
the word, in its most common use, has two meanings, 
one referring to a period of twenty-four hours, and 
the other varying according to the period of the year 
and the latitude of the place. At the poles, the days 
and nights are alternately six months long. 

The Hebrews used the equivalent word to repre- 
sent any period of time, and, as contradistinguished 
from night, the word expressed light and warmth. It 
certainly could not have been appropriated to such 


Accordance of the two Records. 167 

periods as our ordinary days before the fourth Mosaic 
period, when the sun was appointed “ for signs, and 
for seasons, and for days, and years.” The periods 
preceding this must, in the nature of the case, have 
been indefinite. At least we have no means, in the 
present state of our knowledge, of determining their 
length. 

The accordance of the two records, the Mosaic 
and the geological, maybe seen in several things: 
I. The Bible, in direct opposition to atheism and 
pantheism, declares that the earth had a “ beginning,” 
and geology confirms it. That science is emphatically 
a history of beginnings. If we descend in imagina- 
tion and traverse an ideal section of the earth’s crust, 
we shall find formation following formation, and the 
remains of one kind of animated existence after an- 
other, — not in regular gradation,* as infidels pretend, 
but by successive beginnings. It is true that, as a gen- 
eral rule, the less complex tribes were more numerous 
in the earlier ages ; yet the more perfect tribes had 
also their representatives, and in the case of the 
sauroid fishes it has been shown by Dr. Buckland 
that a sort of retrograde development, from complex 
to simple forms, took place, the more perfect species 
being most numerous in the older strata. Entering 
our downward path through the rocks, a single step 
may take us below the dust of Adam and the limits 
of human history. “From the moment we leave the 
mere surface soil, and touch even the nearest of the 
tertiary beds, all traces of human remains disappear, 
so that let our grave be as shallow as it may in even 


Parallel Testimonies . 


1 68 

the latest stratified bed, we have to make it in the 
dust of a departed world.”* In a few steps more we 
find that the fossil remains of all familiar forms of 
life are diminishing, and before we leave the tertiary 
rocks extinct species everywhere predominate. The 
secondary formation receives us into a new series. 
The upper, or chalk beds, are full of strange forms of 
monstrous reptiles; the middle, or coal formation, 
contains the remains of an extinct vegetable flora; 
and thousands of feet below we find traces of the 
inhabitants of the ancient sea. At length we reach 
a region “ older than death, because older than life 
itself.” All the conditions of life appear ended in 
the primitive granite, which forms not only the lowest 
rocks, but also the highest summits of the mountains, 
— “the highest part of the dust of the world” being, 
as the Bible declares, the most ancient. 

2. The Scriptures also teach that the works of 
nature did not all appear simultaneously, nor by 
gradual development, but by successive fiats, or ex- 
ertions of creative power; and abundant proof of 
this, as we have already seen, is furnished by geology. 

Those interpreters who think that the Mosaic days 
were lengthened periods, descriptive of successive 
geologic changes, are not without evidence of proba- 
bility in support of their views ; although we prefer 
the view which regards the changes recorded in the 


* Harris’s Pre- Adamite Earth. If it shall be proved that man 
was cotemporary with the later fossils, the sentiment will still be true 
that he is geologically recent. 


Life before Light. 


169 


earth’s strata to have occurred in the period between 
the first and second verses of Genesis. We quote 
from the parallel drawn by a recent author:* “ From 
Scripture we learn that ‘in the beginning God created 
the heavens and the earth,’ and that the earth was 
without form, and void (invisible and unfurnished), 
and ‘ darkness was upon the face of the deep.’ From 
geology we know that there was a period in the 
ceaseless flow of time when the earth, which is now 
clothed with verdure and throbs with animated na- 
ture, was a watery waste, devoid of physical life, and 
enveloped with muddy vapors and dense clouds of 
mist and fog, which effectually shut out the rays of 
the sun from its surface. 

“ From Scripture we learn that while darkness was 
upon the face of the deep, the creative Spirit of God 
brooded upon the waters, and life preceded light. 
By geology we are taught that the Spirit of the 
Creator terminated the lifeless state of our planet in 
the next succeeding period of time, by pouring sub- 
marine life into the expanse of the primeval ocean, 
and the earliest created specimens of animal life, 
anemones, zoophytes, and coral animalcule, from the 
combination of whose tiny labors the vast beds of 
limestone have proceeded which are found in every 
part of the world, first made their appearance; but all 
of them had this peculiarity, that they were devoid 
of organs adapted to the perception of light; thus 
leading to the conclusion that, according to the 


15 


* Tullidge’s Triumphs of the Bible. 


170 


Vegetation before Sunlight. 


Mosaic narrative, light did not dawn upon the globe 
when life first stirred in the waters. 

“ From Scripture we learn that on the second day 
the atmosphere was formed, and that a canopy of 
clouds was suspended above the firmament, veiling 
the heavenly host of sun, moon, and stars from the 
face of the globe; that afterwards, on the third day, 
dry land and vegetation appeared ; and finally, on the 
fourth day, the canopy of clouds being dissolved, the 
heavenly bodies were for the first time discerned, to 
be from thenceforth ‘ for signs, and for seasons, and 
for days, and for years.’ From geology we know 
that at the close of the Silurian submarine creation 
vast mountains were upheaved by volcanic forces 
from the deep, and land vegetation made its first 
appearance, attesting the previous existence of an 
atmosphere ; and from the same source disclosing to 
us the mineral contents of the great coal measures, 
we know that the nature, quantity, and quality of the 
vegetation which then sprang up were such as to 
demonstrate the growth to have taken place under 
circumstances of long-continued shade, which must 
at last have been dispelled by the dispersion of the 
superincumbent clouds and the admission of the 
direct rays of the sun to the earth’s surface. The 
plants of the great carboniferous epoch are such as 
have never been touched by a sunbeam. They are 
such precisely as would have grown in a humid 
atmosphere; the r wood is not hardened, as that of 
plants on which the pure sunlight falls. Thus both 
the Mosaic and geological records concur in testify- 


Order of Creation. 


Vi 

ing that the order of creation was, a clouded atmos- 
phere, a dry land, and its vegetation, succeeded by 
the direct and unimpeded radiance of the sun, moon, 
and stars. 

“From Scripture we learn that the next display 
of creative power was an abundance of great sea- 
monsters, terrestrial reptiles, and winged creatures; 
and geology exposes to our view in the next suc- 
ceeding strata the organic remains of the then 
existing tyrants of the ocean, the land, and the 
air; and we behold profuse swarms of the gigantic 
saurians which peopled the earth in ‘ the age of 
reptiles.’ 

“From Scripture we learn that the next step was 
the creation of cattle, and creeping things, and beasts 
of the earth (the mammalia). From geology we 
know that the race of quadruped mammals did not 
come into existence until after the age of reptiles; 
that the saurian monsters, with the other oviparous 
reptiles and birds, had been tenants of our globe for 
ages before we find any traces of quadruped mam- 
mals. 

“ Lastly, from Scripture we learn that the closing 
and completing work of the creation was man ; and 
geology triumphantly confirms the revealed fact that 
submarine animals, land vegetation, reptiles, birds, 
and quadruped mammals were all of them in exist- 
ence, successively and collectively, before the first of 
the human race. When the foundations of the house 
had been fixed, and its walls reared, and its star- 
spangled canopy overhung, and its floor carpeted 


Geology teaches Miracles. 


172 

with soft green, and fuel and water laid up in store* 
houses, then, and not till then, did man appear, — 


“‘the master- work, the end 
Of all yet done, a creature who, not prone 
And brute as other creatures, but endued 
With sanctity of reason, might erect 
His stature, and upright with front serene 
Govern the rest, self-knowing; and from thence 
Magnanimous to correspond with heaven, 

But grateful to acknowledge whence his good 
Descends, thither with heart, and voice, and eyes 
Directed in devotion, to adore 
And worship God supreme, who made him chief 
Of all his works.’ — MlLTON. 

“Thus the Record of Moses and Nature’s Record 
bear each other witness in every particular. The 
same narrative told by the ruler of Israel four thour 
sand years ago is also told in its own expressive 
language by the very earth on which we tread, as it 
were ‘graven with an iron pen and lead in the rock 
forever.’ ” 

3. The researches of geology also afford a strong 
refutation of the infidel argument against miracles. 

It has been alleged by Hume and others that a 
miracle is so improbable — so contrary to universal 
experience — that no amount of testimony can prove 
it. But geology shows plainly that the course of 
nature is liable to changes, and interruptions, and 
manifestations of creative power. Through the meas- 
ureless ages before the appearance of man the history 
of creation was the history of the miraculous. The 


Dr. Me Caul on Sacred Scripture Corroboration. 173 

impress of the Creators fingers has been left upon 
the rocks of the pre- Adamite earth, and the leaves 
of the great stone book are as full of instances of 
miraculous power and special interpositions as is the 
volume of Revelation. He who believes the records 
of the earth’s crust can have no antecedent proba- 
bility against the reception of the external evidences 
of the Scriptures. 

4. Geology also presents many analogies confirm- 
ing the probability of the predictions of Scripture 
respecting the final overthrow and conflagration of 
the present world. The Apostle Peter seems to have 
had the objections of modern infidelity before him, 
and answers them in the same manner as geology 
teaches, when he refers to the scoffers of the last 
-days, who inquire, ‘‘Where is the promise of his 
coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all things con- 
tinue as they were from the beginning of the creation.” 
He tells them that they are willingly ignorant of the 
vast changes which have already happened, and refers 
them to the time when “the world that then w r as, 
being overflowed with w ater, perished.” Nothing is 
more palpable than the willing ignorance of skepti- 
cism with reference to past changes. 

After a comparison between Scripture and geology, 
Dr. McCaul pertinently remarks, “Where did Moses 
get all this knowledge? How r was it that he worded 
his rapid sketch w ith such scientific accuracy? If he 
in his day possessed the knowledge which genius and 
science have attained only recently, that know ledge 
is superhuman. If he did not possess this knowledge, 


174 Criticism and Science the Handmaids of Faith. 

then his pen must have been guided by superhuman 
wisdom. Faith has, therefore, nothing to fear from 
science. So far the records of nature, fairly studied 
and rightly interpreted, have proved the most valua- 
ble and satisfying of all commentaries upon the 
statements of Scripture. The ages required for geo- 
logical development, the infinity of worlds, and the 
immensity of space revealed by astronomy, illustrate, 
as no other note or comment has ever done, the 
Scripture doctrines of the eternity, the omnipotence, 
the wisdom of the Creator. Let Science then pursue 
her boundless course, and multiply her discoveries in 
the heavens and in the earth. The believer is per- 
suaded that they will only show more clearly that 
‘the words of the Lord are pure words, as silver tried 
in a furnace of fire, purified seven times.’ Let Criti- 
cism also continue her profoundly interesting and 
important work. Let her explore, sift, analyze, scru- 
tinize, with all her powers, the documents, language, 
and contents of Scripture, and honestly tell us the 
results. It might be shown that even the hostile and 
the skeptical have involuntarily helped in the con- 
firmation of the Christian verity, and that even their 
labors cannot be neglected without loss. But we 
must carefully distinguish between the speculations 
of individuals and the ascertained, settled results of 
criticism. The theory of any one individual, how- 
ever learned, laborious, and genial, is only an opinion, 
perhaps only one of a chaos of conflicting opinions, 
where sound criticism has found no sure footing. 
The settled results are those which, after severe test- 


The Bible philosophical. 


175 


ing, have been unanimously accepted by the com- 
petent, the sober, and the judicious. The former 
may be popular for awhile, and seem to shake the 
faith; but they are gradually overthrown by the 
progress of critical investigation, and take their place 
in the record of things that were. The history of 
the last hundred years, since modern criticism took 
its rise, is sufficient to quiet the believer’s mind as to 
the ultimate result. It tells of theory after theory 
propounded by the critics of the day, first applauded, 
then controverted, then rejected, just like the philo- 
sophic systems of the same period, and yet a gradual 
advance from anti-Christian hostility to an effort after 
scientific impartiality, and a large amount of positive 
gain for the right interpretation of Scripture and 
the confirmation of the old Christian belief. Faith, 
therefore, feels no more fear of criticism than of 
science, being assured that neither can ‘do anything 
against the truth, but for the truth.’ ” 

The subject of the present chapter has exemplified 
that, in the opinion of eminent scientists, and by a 
comparison with the teachings of science itself, “the 
record in the Bible is profoundly philosophical in 
the scheme of creation which it presents. It is both 
true and Divine. It is a declaration of authorship, 
both of creation and the Bible, on the first page of 
the sacred volume. There can be no real conflict 
between the two books of the Great Author. Both 
are revelations made by Him to man, — the earlier 
telling of God-made harmonies coming up from the 
deep past, and rising to their height when man ap- 


176 Our Relations to God superlative. 

peared, the later teaching man’s relations to his 
Maker, and speaking of loftier harmonies in the 
eternal future.”* 

Our relations to God concern us more than the 
curiosities of past history. To know the truth re- 
specting these relations is more important to us 
than to discover a new world. This truth science 
cannot reveal to us: “ The depth saith, It is not in 
me ; and the sea saith, It is not with me. It cannot 
be gotten for gold, neither shall silver be weighed for 
the price thereof. It cannot be valued with the gold 
of Ophir, with the precious onyx, or the sapphire.” 
While all the oracles of science are silent on this 
great question, revelation proclaims, “The fear of the 
Lord, that is wisdom; and to depart from evil is 
understanding.” 


* Dana’s Geology. 


CHAPTER VII, 


THE SPIRITUAL NATURE OF THE SOUL. 


" We are willing to be absent from the body, and to be present with 
the Lord." St. Paul. 


CONTENTS, 

The Scripture Doctrine that Man has a distinct Spiritual Nature — 
Physiology no Refuge for Infidelity — The Circle of Organic Life 
implies a Vital Germ — History of an Atom in the Service of Life 
— Theories of Life — Ancient Theory of Harmony revived among 
the Moderns — Amusing Illustration — Theories of Sublimated Mat- 
ter, or Force, as Cause of Life — All fail to explain the Phenomena 
— Yet a Vital Principle a Necessity to Physiology — Inexplicable 
save as Result of the Union of Matter and Spirit — Somatic and 
Molecular Life — Objection from the Life of Animals and Vegeta- 
bles answered — The Functions of the Nerves require Mind — 
Mental Operations and Mutual Reactions of Body and Mind in an 
Outline of Physiological Metaphysics. 


( 178 ) 


CHAPTER VII. 


THE SPIRITUAL NATURE OF THE SOUL. 

The Bible teaches that man has a spiritual nature 
distinct from the body, the union of which with the 
body is the cause of our present life. It teaches, also, 
that the existence and conscious faculties of the soul 
continue after the death of the body. In other words, 
it represents to us a world of spiritual existences, 
altogether superior to matter, yet capable of acting 
upon matter. The union of some of these spirits 
with material bodies forms the visible world of man- 
kind. Death is referred to in the Scriptures as “ giving 
up the ghost,” or spirit; and very many passages refer 
to the condition of disembodied spirits after death. 
In the account of the creation of Adam, we read that 
“ the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, 
and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and 
man became a living soul thus making an evident 
distinction between the body and the soul. In vari- 
ous parts of the Old Testament we have references 
to disembodied spirits, and various enactments in the 
Mosaic law against consulting them by means of 
divination and necromancy. A large sect of the Jews, 
the Sadducees, denied the separate existence of spirits; 
but in our Saviour’s famous argument with them, He 
showed that the Old Testament clearly taught this 

( 09 ) 


8o 


Physiology not infidel. 


doctrine when it represented God as saying, “ I am 
the God of Abraham, and of Isaac, and of Jacob 
adding, “ for he is not the God of the dead, but of the 
living,” and teaching thereby that these persons, 
although their bodies had been long dead, were 
still living. In accordance with this doctrine, the 
Evangelist St. Luke, in recording the resuscitation 
of the ruler’s daughter, says, “ her spirit came again, 
and she arose straightway.” So, likewise, St. Paul 
speaks of being absent from the body, yet present 
with the Lord ; and St. John, in describing his Apo- 
calyptic visions, declares that he saw the souls of 
those who had been beheaded for their testimony 
of Jesus. Many other passages also have the same 
import. 

In examining the confirmation by modern science 
of these scriptural views, or the scientific evidence of 
spiritual existence, it will be necessary to inquire into 
the origin of life as exhibited by physiology. This 
is confessedly a difficult question, yet one of great im- 
portance, since, driven from the sciences of astronomy 
and geology, infidelity has sought to intrench itself 
in natural history, as in a citadel, and physiologists 
of no mean note have become its allies. Yet even 
here the ground crumbles beneath its feet; and the 
time is not far distant when a man having a scientific 
education will be ashamed to avow himself an infidel. 
In despite of the disingenuous efforts which have 
been made to secretly weave a tissue of skeptical 
philosophy from scraps and shreds of physiology, it 
will be seen that as astronomy and geology bear testi- 


Circle of Organic Life . 1 8 1 

mony to primitive truth as revealed in the Scriptures, 
so likewise does the science which treats of the func- 
tions of living beings. 

Napoleon is said to have remarked to Dr. Antom- 
marchi, at St. Helena, “You physicians are unbe- 
lievers, because you cannot find the soul with your 
dissecting-knife.” However applicable this may have 
been to physicians of that day, it should fail of appli- 
cation now, since the microscope has become to the 
eye of the educated physician and naturalist what 
the dissecting-knife is to his hand. With this instru- 
ment, science has been able to detect the beginnings 
of living structure, and to trace the fundamental laws, 
at least, of the process of development. Chemistry, 
also, has done its part in investigating these phe- 
nomena. From these sources we learn the mutual 
relation as well as the individuality of all natural 
things. From the inorganic world, directly or indi- 
rectly, the bodies of all living things originate, and 
to it they all return. From the mineral world matter 
and force both pass to the vegetable kingdom, and 
the matter is arranged in new forms. The animal 
body, after using the material thus arranged, restores 
both the matter and force to the physical world 
again. In this manner is kept up the wonderful circle 
of organic life; yet in both animal and vegetable 
there must have first existed an animated germ, the 
product of a previously existing organism, which 
uses the physical forces to draw in and appropriate 
the inorganic elements, combines these elements into 
organic compounds, builds up an organized fabric, 
16 


1 82 History of an Atom vitalized. 

and discards finally the atoms and the implements 
which it has used. 

To illustrate this subject, and at the same time to 
show the superiority and independence of the vital 
principle, as it is called (or organizing spirit), to the 
matter it uses, let us consider the history of a single 
atom of matter which has been occupied in the 
service of life. By some means — it is not necessary 
to inquire how — it has become mysteriously endowed 
with life. Let us suppose its first connection with 
vitality to be in the simplest form of vegetable exist- 
ence. It is now part of a simple cell, a bladder-like 
form, with an investing membrane inclosing a fluid 
substance, and containing a few moving granules.* 
This cell is endowed with the power of selecting 
nutriment from the inorganic matter around it for the 
support of its own existence; and after a time it 
gives birth to a number of cells like itself. These 
are inclosed in the original cell, which at last bursts 
and sets them free. After thus multiplying itself, its 
individual life is at an end, and the laws of inorganic 
matter again assert their supremacy, — a supremacy 
resisted and controlled during the vital processes. 
That same particle of matter, after having been united 
with and laid aside by a mysterious vital principle in 
a simple form of being, may be appropriated to the 
use of a higher species. It may form the material 
part of the germ of a noble tree. It is now governed 
by more complicated relationships. Instead of origi- 
nating other cells altogether like itself, its progeny 
assume special forms and special functions, giving 


* See note, p. 214. 


Theories of Life. 


183 

rise to the various tissues and organs of the plant. 
Long before the death of the tree, this same original 
particle may have passed through a variety of changes, 
and may even have served the germs of numerous 
species, both of animal and vegetable life. Now, 
whence comes this wonderful principle of life, which 
thus presses into its service the atoms and laws of 
the material universe? Its effects are too palpable to 
allow a denial of its existence, while its power over 
matter and physical forces proves its distinction from 
either. Although too subtle to be analyzed by the 
philosopher, its existence is suggestive of the highest 
truths. It speaks to us of a spiritual world, — a world 
to which the material universe is subservient, and 
which is itself unaffected by the myriad changes 
which take place around us. 

It will aid us in the investigation of this subject to 
make a brief examination of some of the principal 
theories which have been propounded by philosophers 
in order to account for the phenomena of life. Some 
of these have been long ago exploded ; yet we find 
them occasionally proposed in new forms of words, 
and often with great flourish of trumpets, among the 
skeptics of the present day. 

One of these theories may be thus expressed : Life 
is the result of a general harmony or consent of action 
between the different organs of the body. This view 
was first proposed by Aristoxenus, a celebrated Greek 
physician, who was skilled in music, and who gave 
the name of Harmony to his system, from his attach- 
ment to this science. It was at one time quite fash- 


1 84 


Result of Organization. 


ionable at Rome as well as at Athens. In Plato’s 
Phaedo, Socrates is represented as opposing this 
theory, which had been urged by Simmias against 
the immortality of the soul. He argues that the soul 
existed before the body, as shown by the doctrine 
of pre-existent ideas, — the idea of goodness being 
necessarily anterior to observation of things good ; 
of space to observation of things in space, etc. He 
shows that harmony is relative according as the parts 
may agree more or less, but we cannot say there is 
more or less soul. According to philosophy, he 
teaches, virtue is the harmony of the soul, but it 
would be absurd to speak of a harmony of a har- 
mony. Lastly, he shows that parts of the soul may 
be opposed to each other, as desire and reason, which 
overthrows the idea of harmony. Thus even a pagan 
philosopher could argue against the materialism of his 
age. It is a fatal objection to this theory of harmony 
that it evades the question at issue, viz., the princi- 
ple, or power, or agent, by which the harmonious 
machine has been developed and is kept in perpetual 
play. 

Notwithstanding the forcible arguments against it, 
this theory of harmony, under one form or another, 
has been frequently repeated down to the present day. 
Among superficial thinkers it is expressed in the for- 
mula, Life is the result of organization. Respecting 
this, Coleridge remarks, “ The position seems to me 
little less strange than as if a man should say that 
building, with all its included handicraft of plaster- 
ing, sawing, planing, etc., were the offspring of the 


The Insane Philosopher. 

house; and that the mason and carpenter were the 
result of a suite of chambers.” 

It would be amusing, if it were not sad, to witness 
the artifice with which skeptical physiologists endeavor 
to evade the scriptural doctrine that life is the result of 
the union of something spiritual with the material of 
which the body is composed. Each school of infidel- 
ity is represented by writers on physiology, and their 
definitions and theories are equally unsatisfactory. 
Many of these theories recall to mind the amusing 
illustration of Prof. Schleiden. He says, “Some years 
ago I was very intimate with the directing physician 
of a large lunatic-asylum, and I used industriously to 
avail myself of the liberty I thus obtained to visit at 
will the house and its inhabitants. One morning I 
entered the room of a madman whose constantly 
varying hallucinations especially interested me. I 
found him crouching down by the stove, watching 
with close attention a saucepan, the contents of which 
he was carefully stirring. At the noise of my en- 
trance he turned round, and, with a face of the great- 
est importance, whispered, ‘Hush, hush! don’t dis- 
turb my little pigs; they will be ready directly.’ Full 
of curiosity to know whither his diseased imagination 
had now led him, I approached nearer. ‘ You see,’ 
said he, with the mysterious expression of an alche- 
mist, ‘ here I have black-puddings, pigs’ bones, and 
bristles in the saucepan, — everything that is neces- 
sary ; we only want the vital warmth, and the, young 
pig will be ready made again.’ Laughable as this 
circumstance appeared to me at the time, it has often 
10 * 


1 86 Vain Definitions of Life. 

recurred to me since in seriousness, when I have re- 
flected on certain errors in science ; and if the mere 
form of the delusion were the criterion of sanity or 
insanity, even many distinguished naturalists of our 
time would have to share the narrow cell of my un- 
fortunate Mahlberg.”* 

Bichat defined life as “ the sum of the functions by 
which death is resisted which is merely saying that 
life and death are opposite states. An eminent Eng- 
lish physiologist, Dr. Carpenter, says, “ By the term 
life, we most appropriately designate the state or con- 
dition of a being that exhibits vital actions,” — a defi- 
nition no better than that of Bichat, since it is only 
another mode of saying that life is a state of living. 
Coleridge defined life as “the principle of individua- 
tion.” This is synonymous with separate existence, 
and applies to stones and metals as well as to the or- 
ganic world. All such definitions evade, rather than 
discuss, the question. 

Another theory supposes some exquisitely subtle 
gas or aura — some fine, invisible fluid, sublimed in 
the recesses of Nature’s laboratory — to be the cause 
of life. This formed a part of the old Epicurean phi- 
losophy, and, like the system of harmony referred to, 
exerted an influence over the opinions of subsequent 
ages. What this fluid, or gas, or aura could be, has 
given rise to much speculation. The researches of 
Dr. Black respecting caloric, or heat, caused some to 
regard it as the agent : hence the aphorism, “ Heat is 


Poetry of the Vegetable World. 


Correlation of Forces. 


8 / 


life, cold is death.” The discovery of oxygen, how- 
ever, by Priestley and Lavoisier, and the indispensable 
part it performs in respiration and other functions, led 
many to consider it as the vivifying principle, and 
heat as its attendant.* Then came the discovery of 
galvanism, and its similarity to nervous influence ; and 
immediately physiologists were ready to cry, “ Eu- 
reka!” I have found it! But subsequent investigations 
showed that although galvanism and nerve-force are 
similar in some respects, they are not identical. 

The influence of this theory has continued to the 
present time, especially among the mesmerists, and 
in popular literature, while a modification of it finds 
favor among the learned, under the name of the “cor- 
relation of forces.” This latter view discards the idea 
of a fluid, gas, or aura, but substitutes the term 
“force.” It regards light, heat, electricity, affinity, 
motion, etc. as physical forces, mutually related, and 
actually convertible into each other. Some have 
endeavored to show the applicability of this theory 
to the phenomena of life, and try to explain intellect 
and morals, philosophy and history, by its means. 
The attempt is made to prove that all the varied 
forces manifested in a living being, “mechanical, 
thermal, luminous, electric, chemical, nervous, sen- 
sory, emotional, and intellectual,” are perfectly co- 
ordinated; and that physical activities and intellectual 
operations are so directly correlated that “no idea or 
feeling can arise save as the result of some physical 


* Good’s Book of Nature. 


1 88 The Question unsolved thus. 

force expended in producing it.” This principle is 
even applied to the progress of civilization and the 
statistics of crime, and Mr. Herbert Spencer has made 
it the foundation of his new system of philosophy. 
Stripped of its parade and tinsel, however, this theory 
is nothing but the old materialistic pantheism revived. 
It is the desperate effort of infidelity to press into its 
service the researches of modern physiology, as was 
tried to be done with astronomy and geology; but, 
like these latter sciences, physiology refuses an alli- 
ance with skepticism, and points to a Creator and a 
spiritual world. 

Let the honest skeptic inquire, Does the theory 
referred to explain what is life? Does it show us 
why some particles of matter become organized and 
others do not? Does it make plain why one cell 
develops a vegetable and another an animal, no per- 
ceptible difference being between them, and the cir- 
cumstances of each being the same, except origination 
from different parentage? Can these philosophers 
tell us what they mean by “physical force”? Is it 
matter? Or is it spiritual power or energy superadded 
to matter? Why is it not common to all matter, and 
equally effective upon all ? An answer to these 
questions would cut the Gordian knot. While science 
stands on the very confines of a spiritual world, and 
points across the boundary, why should we fear to 
look in that direction, or spurn the guidance of that 
Faith which would lead us to higher truths? 

The doctrine of the physical origin of life is put 
into popular form in some of the modern treatises 


Life Matter's Master. 


189 


on physiology in such a way that a student may 
easily be led astray; the easier, perhaps, because 
their writers generally disclaim being materialists. 
Yet they teach that life is the “manifestation of 
physical influences,” and that individual and race 
development “depends on physical circumstances,” 
and fancifully trace an analogy between the develop- 
ment of an individual and the progress of history. 
The uningenuous flings at the doctrine of Provi- 
dence, the rhetorical pomposity with which the term 
“law” is substituted for the Deity, and the argu- 
ments for what Newton called “blind metaphysical 
necessity,” show the materialistic tendencies of such 
works. 

The researches of scientific workers, rather than 
theorists, respecting the primitive cell, from which 
all other parts of an organized being are developed, 
point, as we have seen, to something distinct from and 
superior to matter; controlling, selecting, moulding, 
assimilating, and discarding matter, for its own pur- 
poses, and after its own peculiar mode (or law) of 
being. That must be a real existence which mani- 
fests such palpable effects of its presence. Its power 
of control over matter and physical laws proves its 
superiority over, and its distinction from, matter. 
Life is matter’s master, not its slave. Life is a work- 
man ; a builder ; a chemist ; and each organized 
being has its own appropriate life, the result of the 
union of the spiritual and the material in itself. 

Physiologists usually repudiate the term “vital 
principle,” or “ organic agent,” as tending to check 


190 


A Vital Agent true. 


the spirit of philosophic inquiry; but this is by nc 
means a necessary result. It is plainly impossible to 
study the functions of living beings without regard- 
ing them as dependent on something which pro- 
duced and maintains life. This “ vital principle,” or 
“principle of organization,” or “plastic power,” is as 
necessary to physiology as “light” is to optics, or 
“gravitation” to natural philosophy. Whether this 
plastic power be an agent, a condition of things, the 
effect of antecedent physical influences, or the result 
of the union of matter and spirit, is a question about 
which students of nature may differ widely, according 
to their metaphysical or religious proclivities. It is 
a question rather theological or philosophical than 
physiological, and the most elaborate treatises on the 
functions of organized beings might ignore it alto- 
gether, as works on natural philosophy decline to 
investigate the cause of gravity, etc., without being 
subject to the charge of incompleteness. Yet the 
interest, so strongly felt, which attaches itself to the 
question of our own origin, is the charm which com- 
pels us to speculate, whether we confine our specula- 
tions within the boundaries of revealed truth, or in 
the pride of scientific pretension ignore the guidance 
of faith. 

The existence of a living cell seems positive proof 
of a “force,” “ power,” “ principle,” or “ agent,” differ- 
ing from the forces or agencies which we call phys- 
ical, and to which physical conditions and materials 
are subservient. Yet we do not consider life to be 
synonymous with the spiritual agent which produces 


Somatic and Molecular Life and Death . 191 

it. Life is a condition, a result, of the action of im- 
material agents upon unorganized matter. 

Life is propagated by means of a previously exist- 
ing organism. As flame communicates the power 
of combustion from one torch to another, so life is 
transmitted from cell to cell, or from atom to atom. 
In every complex organized body, however, there is 
a somatic vitality, or life of the organism, which is 
independent of cell-life, which gives origin to cells, 
and to which the life and death of myriads of cells 
are necessary. The functions of living beings depend 
upon molecular changes, or the constant destruction 
and renewal of the ultimate cells of which their tissues 
are composed. Yet physiology teaches that somatic 
death is distinct from molecular death. In some 
instances, as in death from pure “ old age,” from a 
powerful electric shock, or from certain poisons, etc., 
somatic and molecular death may be simultaneous ; 
yet in other and perhaps the majority of instances, 
molecular life may be maintained for a brief period 
apart from the organism, or continue for some time 
after the elemental vital spark has fled. Thus, the 
blood-disks retain their individual vitality for some 
time after removal from the body; severed fingers, 
etc. have occasionally adhered to and reunited with 
the body'; the poison of a rattlesnake continues to 
be secreted after death;* hair continues to grow 
upon a corpse, etc. Somatic death is usually con- 
sidered to be the result of some physical changes, — > 


* Carpenter’s General and Comparative Physiology. 


192 


Existence depends on God, 


some molecular death which interrupts the organic 
functions. These changes, likewise, are regarded as 
wholly physical in their origin. Yet the fact that 
molecular or somatic death, or both, may result from 
a violent mental emotion, shows plainly the depend- 
ence of life upon the immaterial or spiritual part 01 
the organism as well as upon its material part. It is 
admitted, also, by the best physiologists that cases 
of sudden death have occurred without any percepti- 
ble structural cause or disorganization.* 

A natural objection against the consideration that 
life results from the union of matter and spirit, arises 
from the fact that vegetables, as well as the lower 
tribes of animals, live and perform organic functions 
equally with ourselves. But such an objection is of 
little weight against well-ascertained facts. We know 
very little of the spiritual world, but analogy suggests 
that there is as much variety in it as in the material 
universe. Existence, either spiritual or material, de- 
pends wholly upon the will of the Creator, and it is 
by no means inconceivable that the animating spirits of 
the lower animals, or of vegetables, after having served 
the Divine purpose in the plan of creation, may pass 
into annihilation. The soul of man has endowments 
evidently surpassing all other inhabitants of this world. 
He has not only consciousness, volition, and a knowl- 
edge of relations, the same in kind but greater in 
degree than other animals, but he is also capable of 
analyzing his own mind, and of knowing his relation 


Carpenter’s General and Comparative Physiology. 


Future Development not pantheistic. 193 

to the Creator of all. Revelation informs us that 
man is endowed also with immortality of being, alto- 
gether independent of the organization which is the 
result of his vitality. 

If it be urged that the very idea of the spiritual 
implies indivisibility and indestructibility, in opposi- 
tion to the ceaseless flow and change of visible and 
material things, we reply that the view of life which 
we have taken by no means necessitates the idea of 
the annihilation of the animating spirit; the question 
of annihilation must be determined on other than 
physiological grounds. Yet indestructibility pre- 
cludes not the idea of change. Our mental habits 
and powers improve or change from day to day. 
Applying this thought to the condition of the ani- 
mated existences which are lower in the scale of 
endowments than man, it will be plain that the un 
folding ages of eternity will afford room enough for 
the development of all. The same organic vitality 
produces the egg, the worm, the chrysalis, the butter- 
fly. And who but the Creator shall say to the vital- 
izing spirit, “ Thus far shalt thou come, and no farther” ? 
This thought is very different from the theory of de- 
velopment put forth by infidelity, since it admits a 
specific creation for each individual, a personal Crea- 
tor, and a personal identity to each animated being. 

The more refined pantheists regard “plants and 
animals as antagonistic and mutually-deviating mani- 
festations of a general natural vitality,” or force, corre- 
lated with and transformable into physical conditions. 
It has been thus poetically expressed by an eminent 
17 


194 Pantheistic View of Vegetable Life. 

German botanist: “The key to the mystery of vege- 
table life lies in the primitively-similar foundation of 
the animal and vegetable kingdom, from which indeed 
both have sprung, but have branched off in different 
directions. The animal nature is in the plant as it 
were caged, and this imprisonment is expressed 
throughout its entire existence, in its formation, and 
relation to the animal kingdom. They are the tears 
of Cypria, the blood of Hyacinth, which in the form 
and color of the flower whisper to us a melancholy 
strain. The complaining Dryad expresses the whole 
soul of the plant. Thus in melancholy seclusion 
does the plant achieve its life-destiny. But the fet- 
tered and slumbering world-spirit, which here scarce 
dares breathe, is the same which in animals bursts 
its bonds forever, and, lastly, sings its hallelujah in 
man.”* 

This poetic pantheism is less reasonable and no 
more conceivable than the view which allows a real 
identity to each spiritual existence, with the capacity 
of indefinite improvement throughout the ages to 
come. 

This latter view receives some confirmation from 
Romans, viii. 19-23 ;f a passage which many divines 

* Unger’s Botanical Letters. 

f “ For the earnest expectation of the creature waiteth for the mani- 
festation of the sons of God. For the creature was made subject to 
vanity, not willingly, but by reason of him who hath subjected the 
same in hope, because the creature itself also shall be delivered 
from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the chil- 
dren of God. For we know that the whole creation groaneth and 
travaileth in pain together until now. And not only they, but ourselves 


Volition and Sensation imply a Soul . 195 

have understood as referring to the future state of the 
brute creation; as well as from those numerous pas- 
sages which speak of the resurrection of the human 
body in a different, more glorious, and spiritual con- 
dition. 

Thus far we have considered the single topic of the 
origin of life, as confirmatory of man’s spiritual na- 
ture; there are, however, other themes of physiology 
which point as clearly to the same truth. The func- 
tions of the nervous system — or sensation and vol- 
untary motion — cannot be explained by any theory 
of materialism whatever. The nerve-structure only 
implies a capability of reception or transmission. A 
second factor is necessary to the product of sensation; 
and that factor is the immaterial soul. The actions 
of the nervous system, also, upon the other organs 
and tissues of the body, as in voluntary motion, 
require for their explanation an agent as different 
from the body as are the sources of light and sound; 
and that agent is the soul. It is true that the active 
exertion of the powers of the soul requires a corre- 
sponding health in the bodily organs, since the most 
accomplished artisan cannot exhibit his full powers 
with imperfect tools and materials; yet as the injury 
or destruction of the implement is no proof of the 
annihilation of the artisan, so the injury or destruc- 
tion of the body may not affect the soul. 

The union of body and mind is a subject of such 

also, which have the first-fruits of the Spirit, even tve ourselves groan 
within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of • 
the body.” 


196 


General Sensation. 


importance and interest that a brief sketch of the 
various affections of the mind and their influence upon 
the body, with the reciprocal action of the body upon 
the mind, will not be inappropriate here. It will serve 
both as proof and illustration of the statement that 
mental phenomena can only be explained by faith in 
spiritual existence. The real basis of mental science 
is an enlightened physiology. A true psychology is 
impossible elsewhere. 

We have already considered vitality as arising from 
the union of spirit and matter and giving rise to a 
peculiar structure, — the organic cell, — with peculiar 
laws and special affinities. We now examine the 
affections and special powers of living beings as seen 
in our own species, beginning with the most general 
and elementary affections of animal life, and rising in 
the scale of special endowments to the highest func- 
tions of our nature. 

The earliest sign of individuality is general, corpo- 
real sensation. This is previous to the senses, and 
independent of the nervous system. It manifests 
itself in animals without nerves, as the polypi, etc., 
and seems to be a necessary attribute of animal life. 
Yet this most primitive and most clearly innate faculty 
implies mind, for by it we know that our body is our 
body. Our corporeal structure is an object of which 
the mind takes cognizance. The presence of this 
sensitivity is a proof of the existence of something 
distinct from the body. 

In addition to general sensitivity, the mind takes 
cognizance of certain physical conditions within the 


Mind not dependent on Brain. 197 

body, as tonicity, buoyancy, languor, hunger, thirst, 
warmth, cold, etc. To this knowledge physiologists 
have given the name of common sensation, or ccenaes- 
thesis. It is conveyed from the various parts of 
the body, and especially from the organs of vegeta- 
tive or organic life, by the sympathetic or ganglionic 
system of nerves. We shall see hereafter how, by 
means of this special apparatus, the various affections 
of the mind act upon the organic functions, and how 
these in turn act upon the mind. 

Another affection of the mind is called sensation, 
or special sense, which is caused by an impression on 
certain parts of the nervous system, which are hence 
called sensitive. For sensation two things are neces- 
sary,— an impressible state of the sensitive organs, and 
a perception by the mind. The nervous organs per- 
taining to sensation are contained in what is called the 
cerebro-spinal system, consisting of the cerebral hemi- 
spheres, or front brain, which is the bodily source of 
voluntary movement; the cerebellum, or back brain, 
for adjusting and combining voluntary motions ; the 
sensory ganglia, or mesocephalon, in immediate con- 
nection with the organs of special sense, as the eye, 
ear, etc. ; the medulla oblongata, a ganglionic centre 
for respiration and deglutition ; and the spinal cord, 
with its accompanying nerves. 

Notwithstanding the importance of continuously 
healthy nerve-structure for the manifestation of men- 
tal phenomena, the mind is not so entirely dependent 
on the brain as is generally supposed. According to 
Morgagni and Haller, every part of the brain ha? 
17* 


9 8 


Voluntary Motions. 


been, in one instance or another, destroyed or disor- 
ganized, without affecting what have been thought to 
be the corresponding intellectual powers. Abercrom- 
bie tells us of a lady in whom one-half of the brain 
was disorganized, who retained, notwithstanding, all 
her faculties to the last, except that there was an im- 
perfection of vision. A man, mentioned by Dr. Far- 
rier, lost no portion of his faculties till his death, which 
was sudden ; but, on examination, the whole right 
hemisphere was found to be destroyed by suppuration. 
A patient of Dr. Kingdon, of Stratton, Cornwall, was 
kicked by a horse. The whole of the brain on one side 
was taken out, and a silver false skull put on. Yet he 
recovered, and his intellect was in no respect disor- 
dered by the accident. Dr. Cowan relates two cases 
of cancer of the brain, of a very extensive character, 
which produced no intellectual disturbance. In the 
attack on the Redan, at Sebastopol, a young soldier 
was shot through the left parietal bone by a Minie 
bullet. The brain protruded through the orifice in 
the skull, and the surgeon thrust his finger to its full 
length within the brain to find the bullet and the 
portion of skull which it had carried inward. Neither 
could be discovered. Yet the wound healed, and the 
man continued lively and intelligent.* Many other 
instances may be found among the curiosities of 
medical literature. 

Many of the motions connected with the nervous 
cords and ganglia are altogether reflex and automatic. 


* Creation’s Testimony to its God, by Rev. T. Ragg. 


Consciousness . 


199 


with which the mind has nothing to do; yet many 
other motions have their origin in the mind, and are 
called voluntary. The sensitive nerves also are in- 
fluential, not upon the brain-structure merely, which 
is inert, but upon the mind. Yet there is no constant 
relation between the integrity of mind and body: 
“ The mind is sometimes an agonizing sufferer while 
the body is in perfect health, and only by degrees, 
by its continued action on the nervous system, brings 
the bodily organs into a sympathetic state. And 
though the body cannot long resist the influence of 
mental disease, the mind can effectually resist the 
depressing influence of bodily disease or bodily pain, 
even to the period of their separation. Paralysis has 
unnerved and unstrung the whole system and yet 
the mind has remained uninjured. Such was the case 
with Talleyrand, who, with a body like a living tomb, 
retained his mental faculties unimpaired. Nor need 
I more than allude to the rejoicing moments of the 
dying Christian, or the triumphs of the martyr at the 
stake, to show how the mind can continue in calm 
serenity while the body is enduring the most ex- 
cruciating torments or losing at once its vitality and 
power.”* 

Consciousness is the knowledge which the mind 
has of its own operations. In some diseased con- 
ditions, as in a swoon or apoplexy, there is uncon- 
sciousness, as well as -the suspension of relations to 
the external world; but it would be just as reasonable 


Creation’s Testimony to its God, by Rev. T. Ragg. 


200 


Ideas. — Feeling. 


to suppose that the body was dead, because uncon- 
scious, as that the soul had ceased to exist. “That 
we cannot conceive how an immaterial substance, 
with whose real essence we are totally unacquainted, 
can exist, while all those powers and properties are 
apparently suspended in their operation, through 
the activity of which we can alone be certified of its 
existence, I am ready to admit; but it never ought 
to be forgotten that our inability to comprehend is 
no argument either against theory or fact.’’* 

Upon our consciousness the nerves which connect 
us with the external world are influential, and all the 
mental faculties are exercised in connection with it 
when the mind takes cognizance of its own operations. 
In the sphere of consciousness are produced what 
are called ideas, by which we mean, in a general 
sense, anything present to the mind as an object of 
thought, whether present really or representatively. 
Some ideas are related to experience, as the principles 
of mathematics, notions of figure, extension, number, 
time, and space. Others are independent of sensible 
representation, as the ideas of good and evil, just and 
unjust, true and false, etc. 

In addition to ideas, connected with consciousness, 
we find feeling, under which term we may include 
sensations (already referred to), sentiments, and emo- 
tions. When we say we feel heat or cold, etc., we 
refer to sensation ; when we speak of feelings of the 
sublime and beautiful, of esteem and gratitude, etc., 


* Drew on the Immateriality and Immortality of the Soul 


Obscure Impressions . 


201 


we refer to sentiments; and when we refer to feelings 
of pleasure or pain, we refer to emotions. The term 
feeling is also used sometimes as analogous to con- 
sciousness or to belief; but it always has reference to 
the mind or spiritual nature. Thus, we say of a thing, 
“ I know it to be true, because I feel, and cannot but 
feel, it to be so,” or “because I believe, and cannot 
but believe it.” If asked how I know that I thus 
feel or believe, I can make no better answer than “I 
believe that I feel,” or “because I feel that I believe.” 
In other words, I am conscious of it. 

In the sphere of personal consciousness, in addition 
to feeling and ideas, we may name certain obscure 
impressions, of which we may be said to be half con- 
scious. They are either such as proceed from the 
sympathetic or vegetative system of nerves, the con- 
nection of which with the brain is more or less inter- 
rupted, or such as the mind does not bestow that 
attention upon which is necessary for clear perception. 
By means of these obscure impressions or percep- 
tions the soul influences and governs the functions 
of vegetative life, as digestion, circulation, respiration, 
secretion, etc. In the opposite direction they are also 
active in all the mental operations, giving us results 
without a consciousness of the successive steps 
employed. In habitual voluntary motions, such as 
playing on the piano, etc., they set the proper muscles 
in action without directing the mind to each. In 
sleep, dreaming, and insanity they play a very con- 
spicuous part, and altogether they make up that 
which we call the disposition or temper of a man. Thus 


202 Influence of Mind on Body. 

the repletion and activity of the blood-vessels stimu- 
late to activity the nervous filaments which accom- 
pany them, and heighten those mental reactions which 
manifest themselves in cheerfulness and courage, and 
in a higher degree in arrogance; while a relaxed con* 
ditijn of the vessels produces a depressing effect. 
The exciting and depressing influence of diseases, 
and of alimentary and medicinal substances, may be 
thus accounted for. 

The phrenic and solar foci of the sympathetic 
nerve are the media through which the functions of 
digestion, assimilation, and secretion affect the mind. 
We all know how these act on the temper. Many a 
man may attribute his misfortunes to the intestines 
of another. How peevish, also, and ill-humored, 
and hypochondriac are dyspeptics! Enteric fever 
also operates severely upon the brain. Yet many 
disorganizations of this system scarcely affect the 
mind, while the smallest changes will sometimes 
deeply disorder it; showing how delicate and unde- 
fined is the union. 

Having thus considered the effects of various 
physical conditions of the body upon the mind, let 
us also glance at the influence of the emotions and 
passions of the mind upon the body. The influence 
of these latter upon the mind itself is a worthy study, 
but would lead us too far from the subject in hand. 
We know how intellectual feelings may rise to en- 
thusiasm and (as in Archimedes) absorb the whole 
nervous action. On the other side, it may sink to 
that despair which at length seizes the skeptic when 


Influence of Mental Passions. 203 

not a ray of truth sheds a gleam into his benighted 
soul. The moral direction of intellectual feeling may 
become an emotion of joyful zeal or of painful repent- 
ance, as seen in the history of many a human heart. 

But, to return, Hope leads the vital current gently 
and equably through all the organs, and has a most 
active and beneficial influence. So we may say of 
Joy, when gentle and durable; hence Virtue, the 
most durable of all joy, is most conducive to health. 
If Joy rises to a lively emotion, the brilliancy of the 
eyes, the inclination to sing, jump, and laugh, the 
quickened respiration, accelerated pulse, increased 
warmth, etc., indicate a more rapid circulation, and 
may lead to cerebral and pulmonary congestions. 
There are several cases on record of death from 
sudden joy. 

Melancholy, and especially its highest degree, 
Hopelesness, produces a directly opposite effect from 
Joy. 

The constant excitement, fluctuating between pleas- 
ure and pain, in which Love keeps the body and 
mind, is known to all. 

Anger is a passion compounded of several emo- 
tions. The clonic spasms of the muscles, producing 
tremors, indicate the excitement which urges the 
circulation to the utmost vehemence; the respira- 
tion keeps pace with it, and in some cases leads to 
pneumo-thorax and bursting of the heart. It acts also, 
through the sympathetic or ganglionic nerves, upon 
the secretions, — the saliva, milk, and bile, — which 
often become actually poisoned. A child died as if 


204 Physiological Metaphysics . 


struck by lightning after taking the milk of its en- 
raged nurse.* 

Thus, while the mind receives impressions from 
the outer world through the anatomical organs of 
the body, it is itself also influential upon the body 
through the same organs, and produces as palpable 
effects as any external agent; proving its separate 
nature from the body. 

To complete this outline of the effects of the union 
of body and mind, we add the following table of the 
subjects pertaining to physiological metaphysics: 


Afferent 
impressions 
deranged 
by disease. 


Volition, 

Conscience, 

Judgment, 

i magination, 

Memory, 

Perception, 

Consciousness, 


Pure Mental Attributes. 


Ideas. Emotions. Impulses. 


Reflex Motion. 


Special sense, 

Common (organic) sensation. 
Corporeal sensation. 


Voluntary motion, 
Expression, 
Involuntary motion, 
Instincts, or con- 
sensual actions. 


Efferent mo- 
tions inter- 
rupted by 
sleep, Intoxi- 
cation, Insan- 
ity, etc. 


In the lower part of this plan are placed the ani- 
mal functions, or the various actions of the nervous 
system, and in the upper part the purely mental 
operations or attributes. On the left of the lower 
division we note those impressions which are con- 
veyed to the mind or act upon the body by means 
of nerves called afferent, because proceeding from the 
surface towards the great nerve-centres ; and on the 


* This whole subject is more fully treated in Feuchtersleben’s 
Medical Psychology. 


Perception. 205 

right hand are placed the motions produced by nerves 
(efferent) proceeding from the nerve-centres. 

Instincts and involuntary motion are produced by 
the reflex action of the nerves themselves, but expres- 
sion and voluntary motion require the cognizance of 
the mind. The sphere of consciousness pertains to 
both body and mind: hence it is placed in the centre 
of the plan, in connection with ideas, emotions, and 
impulses. 

The tendency of physiology is to locate conscious- 
ness in the mesocephalon, or middle brain. This is, 
doubtless, the seat of emotion ; and in diseases of 
disturbed or excited emotion, as chorea or hysteria, 
the nerves most affected are those connected with 
this structure. The influence of the mesocephalon 
extends upwards to the cerebral convolutions, back- 
wards to the cerebellum, and downwards to all the 
nerves of sensation and motion. Hence the im- 
portant share which emotion has in the formation of 
character. 

Having already defined consciousness, it remains 
to give brief descriptions of the remaining mental 
operations, or powers, included in the above list. 
Perception is the evidence we have of external objects 
by our senses. On the bodily side it is necessary 
that the organs and nerves be sound, or false percep- 
tions will result. The ringing and other noises in the 
ears (tinnitus), floating dark specks before the eyes 
(muscae volitantes), and many spectral illusions (as in 
the celebrated case of Nicolai, — recorded by Sir D. 
Brewster, — in whom plethora was associated with a 
18 


2o6 


Memory. 


great variety of phantasms), have their origin in a 
diseased condition of the organs. Yet that percep- 
tion is an attribute of the mind is evident from the 
fact that attention is required. The senses may be 
impressed by their appropriate objects, but without 
attention they are not perceived. Thus, in touch, the 
voluntary motion tests hardness, weight, and form ; 
and in hearing a concert we may concentrate atten- 
tion upon some sounds and be oblivious to the rest. 
The mental influence of this faculty is quite evident 
in some blind and deaf persons who make great 
progress on account of attention. 

Memory implies a former conscious experience, its 
retention, revival, and recognition. The preternatural 
excitements of the brain, as in fever or drowning, 
develop it strongly, rendering it highly probable that 
no conscious thought has ever perished. Some cir- 
cumstances seem to imply that every nerve and organ 
of sense has its own memory, or is capable of re- 
viving in the mind its former consciousness. Hence 
the laws of memory, which are coexistence and suc- 
cession, analogy and contrast: some enumerate them 
as resemblance, contiguity, cause, effect, contrast. 

Many curious illustrations of the laws and conditions 
of memory are on record. Thus, Van Swieten relates 
that he was seized with vomiting on passing a certain 
spot where some years before he had experienced a 
horrible stench. Instances have occurred in which 
the stimulus of disease has awakened the recollection 
of things which had been long forgotten, and the 
language of infancy has been renewed in persons 


Imagination. 


207 


who had for many years known only some other 
tongue. Long passages of Homer, etc., forgotten 
during health, have come before the mind during 
fever, even without any delirium. Some particular 
injuries, also, have affected the memory of some 
particular things rather than others, as in the case of 
a medical man who lost all recollection of his wife 
and children after having been thrown from his 
horse, although his intellect in other respects re- 
mained sound.* Loss of memory on particular 
topics is often connected with attacks of an apoplectic 
nature. A variety of this kind, called aphasia, has 
lately claimed special attention, from its increasing 
frequency. In this the patient retains a correct idea 
of the person or thing, but cannot recall the word or 
name. Sometimes one word is used for another, or 
words are invented which to a stranger would be 
quite unintelligible. 

Imagination is a term used to represent the power 
which the mind has of combining ideas previously 
received. Imaginations, or images produced by this 
faculty, are sometimes so vivid as to affect the organs 
of sense, and occasion morbid sensual delusions, as 
well as to influence the organs of motion, secretion, 
etc. No proof could be more positive of the inde- 
pendent agency of the mind. Thus, without any 
external stimulus other than the agency of the mind 
itself, a variety of sensations may be experienced in 
the body, the secretions, as tears, saliva, milk, etc., 


* Abercrombie’s Intellectual Philosophy. 


208 Judgment. — Conscience. 

are increased, and unconscious gesticulations and 
soliloquies, as in excited and sleeping persons, are 
produced. The excessive use of imagination causes 
first excitement, and then torpor, of all the functions. 
The hot- house education and premature development 
of this faculty of imagination, in modern society, have 
led to marasmus, spinal curvature, heart-affections, 
tubercles, etc. The frequent over-excitement and 
relaxation of the brain from this cause react on its 
nutrition, and may in some cases end in idiocy. 

In its highest degree, Imagination rises to the 
sphere of creative fancy, or poetic power. In some 
of its flights it encroaches upon the prerogative of 
conscience, or moral susceptibility, and leads to self- 
deception unless held in check by the precepts of 
Divine revelation. 

Judgment is the decision of the mind, the result 
of comparing two or more ideas. It is altogether 
mental in its application. It is an act of the mind 
upon and within itself. 

Conscience is sometimes called moral sense, moral 
faculty, moral judgment, and susceptibility of moral 
emotions. It might also be termed the faith faculty, 
or the inspirational capacity of the soul. It is that 
faculty, or combination of faculties, by which we have 
ideas of right and wrong respecting actions, and cor- 
respondent feelings of approbation or disapprobation. 
It brings us into relation with the spiritual world, 
the claims of God and duty, etc. Awakened, quick- 
ened, and guided by the Spirit of God, it results in 
the highest type of humanity, — a real Christian. 


Personality. 


209 


Some have called it the light of nature ; but it is 
doubtful if this faculty is ever really active unless 
affected by special spiritual influences and enlight- 
ened by a knowle.dge of the Divine will. Without 
the latter it is certainly no safe guide for human con- 
duct; for as St. Paul was conscientious when consent- 
ing to the death of Stephen and the persecution of 
the early Christians, so many a man has committed 
great crimes in all good conscience. 

Volition is the dominion exercised by the mind 
over itself, employing or withholding its faculties in 
any particular action. It is synonymous with free 
agency, and is an essential attribute of spirit, since 
the very idea of spirit supposes self-action. Feuch- 
tersleben draws a very judicious distinction, however, 
between the essential freedom of the spirit and the 
freedom of the spirit linked to the body. He shows 
that freedom may — 1st, limit itself, so far as the spirit 
makes itself the slave of sin or error; 2d, it may be 
limited by physical laws from without; 3d, it maybe 
limited by organization. In the first, the free man is 
good and wise; in the second, powerful; and in the 
third, healthy. 

The spirit is connected with consciousness corpo- 
really in receiving impressions through the organs 
of sensation, and by reaction with the will by the 
organs of motion. This connection of body and mind 
is complicated by temperament, age, capacity, sex, 
habit, idiosyncrasy, race, nationality, profession, and 
education. The result of all these relations we call 
person or abstract personality. 

18 * 


210 


Accountability. 


When the mind of a man has such a mastery over 
his organs as, consistently with his individual person- 
ality, it is capable of obtaining, when he so thinks, feels, 
and wills, as, for example, in the character of a person 
of sanguine temperament, of a youth, of a person of 
eminent talents, of a soldier, etc., he can and ought 
to think, feel, and will, he is psychologically free, — 
that is, he is in health ; when he cannot, he is out of 
health. As a further illustration, if a man traveling 
on a railroad is prevented by the rapid motion from 
discerning the landscape, he is mechanically unfree. 
If he does not attend because he is stupidly insensi- 
ble to the beauties of nature, he is ethically unfree. 
If he does not attend because he has not learned what 
is to be seen in these objects, he is logically unfree. 
If he does not attend because he is engrossed by 
interesting conversation, he is hindered by his per- 
sonality, which he may, however, command. If he 
cannot attend because he is suffering from headache, 
or because a mental image flits before him, so that 
he does not perceive outward objects, he is out of 
health, and consequently irresponsible. 

It is difficult to determine the boundary of a 
healthy personality, and, as a consequence, account- 
ability, since we cannot always determine conscious- 
ness in another, — and every one can govern himself 
if he is conscious. There is, moreover, a state of 
transition, caused by certain half-free conditions, as 
sleep, dreaming, intoxication, and vertigo produced 
by mental causes. Our present outline of mental 
powers would be incomplete without some reference 


Dreaming. 


21 1 


to these states: we therefore condense from the 
author last referred to, and add a few remarks of our 
own respecting them. 

The necessity of sleep arises from the compensa- 
tion required by the nervous system for what has 
been expended. Its causes are fatigue, or suspended 
physical powers; intense and prolonged effect of 
heat or cold ; stupefaction, as by odors or strong 
liquors, — which act by lowering nervous vitality; 
mechanical pressure upon the brain, impeding the 
connection with the sensorium ; voluntary reveries ; 
intense mental action, and monotonous noise, pre- 
venting the conscious formation of ideal images. 

That personality is not suspended, but merely 
hindered or impeded in manifestation, is proved by 
voluntary waking at a predetermined hour. Having 
no external images through sensitive nerves, the 
personality has intercourse with subjective or in- 
ternal images, which constitutes dreaming. The 
mind is then occupied with the pictorial world of 
fancy, the materials of which are drawn from the 
store of memory. The obscure ideas conveyed from 
the vegetative organs by the sympathetic nerve, play 
a conspicuous part in dreams, although their cause is 
not recognized by the mind, which ascribes them to 
external sources. Yet the organs of perception are 
not wholly inert, since the noise of a falling book 
may cause a dream of a pistol-shot, etc. 

The organization and mental furniture of an in- 
dividual are reflected in dreaming; hence every one 
has his own world when asleep, and when awake 


212 


Animal Magnetism . 


that of others and his true relation to it. Hence 
there can be usually no instruction in dreams. Yet 
in this condition the mind is most withdrawn from 
the ordinary influences of the world around; hence 
the adaptability of the dream-state to spiritual com- 
munication and inspiration, as referred to so often in 
the Scriptures. 

Intoxication may be either from spirituous liquor, 
narcotics, or exalted imagination. It excites the cir- 
culation and leads to cerebral congestion and stupe- 
faction. It is a state, as is well known, of varying 
proportions. 

Vertigo from rapid succession of ideal images is a 
state resembling intoxication from mental causes. 

Of these states, dreaming has the most interest in a 
scientific point of view. When carried to a patho- 
logical extent it becomes somnambulism. This is a 
condition of intense sleep, and the obscure images 
and instincts are most powerful. This is not a more 
exalted state, free from the trammels of the body, 
but a lower and diseased state, in which volition 
yields the sceptre to physically directed fancy. This 
condition may be brought about both by mental and 
bodily causes. On the one side, grief, suffering, 
mental exertion, passion, and a too effeminate edu- 
cation, and on the other, sexual indulgence, abuse 
of liquor, indigestible food, and other diseases, may 
result in somnambulism. Larrey brought it on in a 
wounded soldier whenever he probed a wound which 
led to the solar plexus. 

Animal magnetism is a sort of somnambulism 


Religions Sentiment. 


213 


produced by strong mental impressions. In it the 
obscure ideas become prominent, and are expressed 
positively, as a divination; sympathy obtains the 
mastery, the feeling alone is exalted, and the percep- 
tion and will are suppressed. The languages and 
flights of fancy exhibited by the clairvoyant are no 
doubt reproductions of dormant recollections. After 
all that its votaries have claimed for it, and the multi- 
tudes who have experimented with it, no new idea 
has been added by its means to the stock of human 
knowledge, but much has been witnessed that was 
vague, foolish, and wicked. There is a clairvoyance 
superior to that of the so-called magnetic : it is that 
of a wise, virtuous, and pious man. 

In examining thus a few particulars in which the 
bodily organization is acted upon by its spiritual 
inhabitant, and how it reacts also upon the mind, we 
have found abundant proof of the independent nature 
of the soul as taught in Holy Writ. The religious 
sentiment arising from such inquiries is well expressed 
in the Psalmist’s ascription of praise to his Maker: 
“I will praise thee; for I am fearfully and wonderfully 
made: marvelous are thy works; and that my soul 
knoweth right well. My substance was not hid from 
thee, when I was made in secret, and curiously 
wrought in the lowest parts of the earth. Thine 
eyes did see my substance, yet being imperfect; and 
in thy book all my members were written, which in 
continuance were fashioned, when as yet there was 
none of them. How precious also are thy thoughts 
unto me, O God! how great is the sum of them] 


214 


Religiotts Sentiment. 


If I should count them, they are more in number than 
the sand; when I awake, I am still with thee. . . 
Search me, O God, and know my heart; try me, and 
know my thoughts; and see if there be any wicked 
way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.” 


Note. — The progress of Histology has shown that the elementary cell 
is still more simple than the above description. It is simply a mass of 
living jelly. The membrane and granules referred to are formed 
materials, and not essential to the existence or integrity of the cell, 
whose vital actions are associated with the continual assimilation and 
rejection of material particles, as described above. 


CHAPTER VIII. 


THE DOCTRINE OF A MEDIATOR. 


" Once in the end of the world hath Christ appeared to put away sin by 
the sacrifice of himself.” St. Paul. 


CONTENTS. 


Ideas of Mediation and Sacrifice historical — Their Limitation to the 
Person of Christ the Characteristic of Christianity — Yet this opposed 
by Professed Adherents — Scripture Statement — Manner of Atone- 
ment not explained — History of the Doctrine from Apostolic Times 
— Summary of Anselm’s Views — No Real Objection to Mediation 
in general — Christ’s Mediation presupposes God’s Moral Govern- 
ment, including Future Punishment — Analogies in Men’s Circum- 
stances in Life — Mystery no Objection — Vicarious Suffering accords 
with the Moral Sense of Mankind. 


(216) 


CHAPTER VIII. 


THE DOCTRINE OF A MEDIATOR. 

The assertion of the mediatorial office of Christ is 
the distinguishing doctrine of the Christian religion. 
Ideas of mediation, and of atonement by sacrifice, 
are historical in many nations, even the most ancient, 
and may be traced directly to that primitive religion 
of the earliest ages which was originally revealed 
from heaven. The promise of a Saviour, given to 
Adam, has been distorted in various ways by the 
imaginations of mankind, yet it has never been wholly 
lost. To the majority of the world it has been a 
light shining in a dark place until the day-dawn and 
the day-spring arise in their hearts. In the Jewish 
nation that light was increased by successive commu- 
nications from heaven, and the Old Testament con- 
tains the history of those communications until the 
birth of Jesus, in whom all the promises and prophe- 
cies culminated. The limitation of the ideas of media- 
tion and atonement to the person and work of Christ 
constitutes the individuality of Christianity, since but 
for this limitation there is nothing in it to distinguish 
it from the systems of ancient philosophy. Its moral 
teaching, its doctrines of a personal Creator, of the 
spiritual nature of man, of a future state, and even of 
the resurrection of the dead, may be found else- 
19 (217) 


2l8 


Opposition. 


where ; but that Jesus came into the world to save 
sinners ; that his death was an offering, and that re- 
pentance and remission of sins must be preached in 
his name; in other words, that Christ is the true me- 
diator between God and man, is plainly characteristic. 

The greatest opposition to Christianity has been 
directed against the personal mediation of Christ, as 
the doctrine most obnoxious to infidelity. Even 
persons who adhere strongly to a belief in the Divine 
existence and in man’s spiritual nature are found 
objecting against the idea of atonement through the 
vicarious sufferings of Jesus. Many of these persons 
profess a strong attachment towards Christianity, but 
their love is for a modified form of it, very different 
from that which the apostles taught. They believe 
that God cares for man, and that He has spoken to man 
through his Son, but they regard Jesus as a Teacher 
rather than a Saviour, and the gospel as a system of 
morals and aesthetics rather than a revelation of 
spiritual force. They believe that Christ had a super- 
human, if not, in some sense, a Divine, character, but 
they consider his life to be merely an example of 
unrivaled teaching and of marvelous self-sacrifice, 
and his death a mere martyrdom. They accept Christ 
as a teacher or prophet, perhaps as a king, but not as 
a priest. They exclude the atonement from their 
scheme of Christianity, and regard religion simply 
as a system of morals. They expect Christianity tc 
prevail in the world by the destruction of its forms 
and dogmas, and by its being received as the highes 1 
type of ethics. If, however, there is any scriptural 


Scripture Representation. 


219 


teaching which is in full accordance with the analogy 
of nature and the constitution of things, it is that of 
the mediation of Christ for the salvation of men. The 
arguments of Bishop Butler are so conclusive respect- 
ing this that we content ourselves with pursuing the 
path which he has so ably pointed out. 

Christ is represented in the Scriptures not only as 
“the light of the world,” but also as a propitiatory 
sacrifice and atonement for sin. “Sacrifices of expia- 
tion were commanded the Jews, and obtained amongst 
most other nations, from tradition, whose original 
probably was revelation. And they were continually 
repeated, both occasionally, and at the returns of 
stated times, and made up great part of the external 
religion of mankind. ‘But now once in the end of 
the world hath Christ appeared to put away sin by 
the sacrifice of himself.’ ”* As He is our propitiatory 
sacrifice, He is called “the Lamb of God,” and as He 
voluntarily offered himself up, He is styled our 
“High-Priest.” In accordance with the usage of its 
language, the Old Testament refers to Him as if He 
had already come. “ He was wounded for our trans- 
gressions. He was bruised for our iniquities. The 
chastisement of our peace was laid upon Him: and 
with his stripes are we healed.” In the New Testa- 
ment we read that “He suffered for sins, the just for 
the unjust;” that “ He gave himself a ransom for all 
that He “hath redeemed us from the curse of the 
law, being made a curse for us;” that He “died for 


* Butler’s Analogy. 


220 


Manner not explained. 


us;” that “we have not been redeemed with corrupti 
ble things, such as silver and gold, but with the 
precious blood of Christ;” that “we have redemption 
in his blood, even the forgiveness of sins;” that He 
“was once offered to bear the sins of many;” and 
that “we are sanctified, through the offering of the 
body of Jesus Christ, once for all.” These, and 
other passages, show that the Scriptures teach the 
connection of Christ’s sufferings and death with the 
salvation of sinners, or, in other words, the satisfac- 
tion of Divine justice for the sin of man by the sub- 
stituted sufferings of the Son of God. Such passages 
cannot be explained on the supposition that the 
sufferings and death of Christ were only a great 
example, preaching the evil of sin and the dignity 
of sorrow. 

In what particular way the death of Christ has 
efficacy to redeem and pardon and sanctify the peni- 
tent believer is not explained in the Scriptures, nor is 
it necessary, except as a matter of speculation or 
theory. The simple fact is set forth that Christ’s 
death has removed the obstacles which were in the 
way of mercy and forgiveness to sinful men, and this 
is a sufficient ground for Christian faith and practice. 

The doctrinal summaries (or creeds) of Christian 
churches or communities usually adhere to the sim- 
ple biblical representation ; but particular teachers 
sometimes enlarge and reason upon it, so as to show 
its acceptability to the enlightened reason. This is 
eminently proper, since we are nowhere forbidden in 
God’s word to employ our reasoning faculties upon 


History of the Doctrine. 


221 


the elucidation of revealed truth. Some, however, 
with more zeal than knowledge, make use of very 
exaggerated and injudicious expressions, and repre- 
sent God as actually injured by the sins of men, and 
so angered and enraged (in the sense of perturbation) 
that it was necessary He should be propitiated. Even 
if such language is used only in a figurative sense, 
meaning that the law of God must be preserved 
inviolate, and that the punishment following trans- 
gression can only be ameliorated or removed by a 
remedial mediation, still it would be better for the 
cause of truth to avoid such exaggerated language, 
it is so different from the sublime announcement, 
“God so loved the world that He gave his only- 
begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on Him 
should not perish, but have everlasting life.” 

To the minds of the apostles, the subject of the 
atonement was beset with no difficulties. Trained 
from childhood in the idea that God was approach- 
able by sacrifice, they beheld in the death of Jesus 
the realization of their religious aspirations, the ful- 
fillment of the Jewish sacrificial types, and the true 
offering for human guilt. The early Fathers of the 
church also refrained from speculation upon this 
subject, and confined themselves to the simplicity of 
scriptural language; but, as time passed on, crowds 
of Gnostic and Platonizing theorizers, the prototypes 
of modern schools, began to philosophize, and call 
in question the cardinal doctrines of Christianity and 
the cause of the atoning death of Christ. They rested 
not by simple faith in the mysterious facts revealed, 
19 * 


222 


Anselm's View. 


but sought to find reasons for the facts, and endeav- 
ored to measure the Infinite by their own finite stand- 
ards. In those dark ages of the church, when the 
natural consequences of such theorizing produced its 
evil fruit, many regarded the atonement as a price 
paid to Satan for the ransom of mankind. Others 
taught the need of penance and suffering to complete 
the work of Jesus. Others, again, taught that Christ 
paid the exact debt which we should have paid. 
Still, in every generation there were luminaries in 
the church which dispensed the light of truth and 
protested against error, and, as the word of God be- 
came unfettered, the apostolic doctrine of the atone- 
ment, as well as other truths, revived in the under- 
standings and hearts of men. Anselm of Canterbury 
and Thomas Aquinas are distinguished among those 
who have contributed to this end, and the Reformers 
of Germany and England have entered into their 
labors. In his treatise upon this subject, Anselm 
defines sin as the withholding from God what is due 
to Him from man. Sin is debt. But man owes to 
God the absolute and entire subjection of his will, at 
all times, to the Divine law and will. This is not 
given, and hence the guilt, or debt, of man to Deity. 
The extinction of this guilt does not consist in simply 
beginning again to subject the will entirely to its 
rightful sovereign, but in giving satisfaction for the 
previous cessation in so doing. God has been robbed 
of his honor in the past, and it must be restored to 
Him in some way, while at the same time the present 
and future honor due to Him is being given. It is 


Infinite Merit needed for Atonement. 


223 


impossible for man, who is still a sinner, to render 
this satisfaction; yet this impossibility does not re- 
lease him from his indebtedness or guilt, because 
it is the effect of a free act, which must be held re- 
sponsible for all its consequences. But the question 
arises, Cannot the love and compassion of God ab- 
stracted from his justice come in at this point, and 
remit the sin of man without any satisfaction? This 
is impossible, because it would be irregularity and 
injustice. If sin is punished neither in the person of 
the transgressor nor in that of a proper substitute, 
then unrighteousness is not subject to any law or 
regulation of any sort; it enjoys more liberty than 
righteousness itself, which would be a contradiction 
and a wrong. Furthermore, it would contradict the 
Divine justice itself, if the creature could defraud the 
Creator of that which is his due, without giving any 
satisfaction for the robbery. Since there is nothing 
better and greater than God, there is no attribute 
more just and necessary than that primitive right- 
eousness innate to Deity which maintains the honor 
of God. This justice, indeed, is God himself, so that 
to satisfy it is to satisfy God himself. There are two 
ways, argues Anselm, in which the claims of justice 
can be satisfied. First, the punishment may be actu- 
ally inflicted upon the transgressor. But this, of 
course, would be incompatible with his salvation from 
sin and his eternal happiness, because the punishment 
required is eternal, in order to offset the infinite de- 
merit of robbing God of his honor. It is plain, 
therefore, that man cannot be his own atoner, and 


224 


Love satisfies Justice. 


render satisfaction for his own sin. A sinner cannot 
justify a sinner, any more than a criminal can pardon 
his own crime. The second and only other way in 
which the attribute of justice is satisfied is by substi- 
tuted or vicarious suffering. This requires the agency 
of another. Yet everything depends upon the nature 
and character of the Being who renders the substituted 
satisfaction. For it would be an illegitimate pro- 
cedure to defraud justice by substituting a less for a 
more valuable satisfaction. It belongs, therefore, to 
the conception of a true vicarious satisfaction that 
something be offered to justice for the sin of man 
that is greater than the finite and created. In other 
words, an infinite value must pertain to that satisfac- 
tion which is substituted for the sufferings of man- 
kind. Only God, therefore, can make this satisfaction. 
Only Deity can satisfy the claims of Deity. But, on 
the other hand, man must render it, otherwise it 
would not be a satisfaction for man’s sin. Conse- 
quently, the required and adequate satisfaction must 
be the anthropic, — i.e. rendered by a God-man. As 
God, the God-man can give to Deity more than the 
whole finite creation could render.* 

This summary of Anselm’s reasoning will enable 
the thoughtful inquirer to see that there is no alter- 
native for the Divine benevolence but either to leave 
the sinner to the natural and ordinary course of jus- 
tice, or else to deliver him from it by satisfying its 
claims for him and in his stead. The love of God is 


* See Shedd’s History of Doctrines. 


Varied Views. 


225 


magnified in thus satisfying his own justice for the 
sinner by the gift and sacrifice of his Son. No lati- 
tudinarian views can lay aside the claims of Divine 
justice, nor show how these claims can be met with- 
out the sacrifice of Christ. Justice cannot be ignored 
by prerogative, nor satisfied without atonement, but 
the infinite merit of Christ’s sacrifice fully suffices for 
the infinite demerit of sin. Here only do righteous- 
ness and peace meet together. Here holiness and 
love are reconciled. 

It is hard to see how the logic of Anselm can be 
set aside, if we admit the world to be under the 
government of moral law at all. Such reasoning, 
however, must not be regarded as the basis of our 
faith, since we can only know of God’s will concerning 
us by what He has revealed; yet rational argument, 
as well as analogy, tends to confirm our faith by 
showing the consistency of Bible teaching with the 
order of our own minds, — the Eternal Reason in the 
word corresponding with his manifestation in our 
own spiritual arid rational nature, as well as with the 
world around us. 

Anselm’s theory of satisfaction has had general 
acceptance both among Roman Catholics and Prot- 
estants, the latter, however, preferring the modifica- 
tion of it taught by Thomas Aquinas, that the value 
of Christ’s blood was infinite, on account of the in- 
finite dignity of his person, and therefore outweighed 
the sins of all men. Duns Scotus, on the other hand, 
maintained that God was satisfied with the ransom 
paid, although it had not in itself any infinite value. 


226 Socinian Objections . 

The tendency to hypothetical speculation and ex- 
aggerated expressions concerning the Divine wrath, 
such as before referred to, led many sincere Christians 
to repudiate this mode of representation, as contrary 
to reason and Scripture. Even the harmless term 
satisfaction, and the figurative expressions relative to 
debt, which had been introduced by Anselm, were 
disapproved, because they were so often perverted. 
Reinhard and other German writers regard the death 
of Christ as a solemn declaration that God will be 
merciful to sinners. “God thus appears as a loving 
father, who is willing to grant pardon to sinners, but 
also as a just and wise father, who, far from exhibiting 
any unseasonable and improper tenderness, will im- 
plant in the minds of the children whom He pardons 
a most vivid aversion to their former sins, and teach 
them by an example the dreadful consequences that 
attend the violation of his laws, and the misery which 
they themselves have deserved.” 

Socinianism has made the strongest opposition to 
the theory of satisfaction, by arguing that the terms 
satisfaction and remission of sins contradict each 
other, — that if another make payment for debt it has 
the same value as if it had been paid by the debtor 
himself, and a gift is out of the question, — that the 
sufferings of the innocent could not satisfy the de- 
mand for the punishment of the guilty, — and that 
what Christ has done and suffered for us is no true 
equivalent for a guilty race, since He suffered only 
one temporal death. These and similar arguments 
lead them to regard the death of Jesus as that of a 


Summary . 


227 


martyr, or as the necessary transition to his subse- 
quent exaltation, and not in any proper sense a 
substituted sacrifice. 

The Mystics sought to find the true principle of 
redemption in the repetition in themselves of the 
sacrifice once made by Christ, — i.e. in literally crucify- 
ing their own flesh. Thus they expected to realize a 
second and internal redemption. 

The many-sidedness of truth finds a striking illus- 
tration in the various speculations concerning the 
atonement. If we regard it from the standpoint of 
moral government, it is a satisfaction to essential 
justice provided by Divine love. Yet it was also an 
example of the righteousness of God, and a solemn 
confirmation of his willingness to pardon sin. It was 
also the necessary transition to Christ’s glorification, 
and the means of our personal sanctification and 
crucifixion of the flesh. In addition to these views, 
we may also regard it as the necessary and divinely- 
appointed means, ordained before the foundation 
of the world, to exalt the human race, through its 
glorified Head, to closest Divine communion and 
pre-eminence. 

Whatever difficulties were in the way of our pardon 
and access to God have been removed by Christ’s 
death. “For He hath made Him to be sin [or a sin- 
offering] for us, who knew no sin ; that we might be 
made the righteousness of God in Him.” We may 
not be able to understand exactly how this effect has 
been produced, but we are satisfied that God selected 
this extraordinary means from the impulse of hi.s 


228 Moral Government implied. 

own sincere love and benevolence to man. “ Herein 
is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us, 
and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.” 

There can be no reasonable objection to the idea 
of mediation, or of a Mediator, in general, since the 
whole visible government of God is a system of 
means and agencies and second causes, and the 
highest result of the researches of physical science is 
to discover and arrange these agencies in the order 
(or law) of their operation. All creatures are brought 
into the world by the mediation of others. Our lives 
in infancy are preserved by the instrumentality of 
others. Food is the medium of nutrition. Air 
mediates to the purification of the blood, and every 
satisfaction of life is obtained in like manner. Why 
should the mediation of Jesus be stricken out of the 
concurrent chain of agencies which make up the 
order of the Divine government of the universe? Do 
we wish to be independent, as God is? An honest 
answer to this question might reveal the real secret 
of much of the infidelity which is in the world. 

The mediation of Jesus necessarily presupposes 
the moral government of God, implying the spiritual 
nature of the soul, its relation to God as a creature 
under law, and the future punishment of voluntary 
wrong-doing. This is evident; for if there is no 
danger there can be no salvation. But the representa- 
tion of the principles of his spiritual government, as 
exhibited in the Scriptures, does not contradict the 
order of nature in the circumstances and conditions 
of human life, since the Author of Nature is also the 


Punishment of Sin. 


229 


God of the Bible. If there be punishment for vio- 
lating natural law, the same principle will apply to 
morals. If the breach of a natural law entails suffer- 
ing, may not the natural and necessary consequence 
of sin be suffering also? If we expect to be injured 
by falling from a precipice, can we hope to go free 
when we violate a principle of moral rectitude? That 
were to make the Creator of the world and the Re- 
vealer of moral law very different beings. As moral 
law relates chiefly to the moral and spiritual nature 
or soul of man, so it may be reasonably supposed 
that the suffering consequent on sin may principally 
affect the soul ; yet, as we have seen that soul and 
body act reciprocally upon each other, so the dark- 
ness or suffering of the soul will degrade the body. 
The full nature of the punishment of sin, however, 
can never be known until the age of mediation and 
probation has passed away, and the age of retribution 
comes. In the mean time, the warnings of Holy Writ, 
given in various figures of speech, are both salutary 
and wise. “The prudent man foreseeth the evil, but 
the simple pass on and are punished.” 

That the full punishment of sin is yet future, is an 
objection often urged. The Bible says, “Because 
sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily, 
therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully set in 
them to do evil. Though a sinner do evil an hu-ndred 
times, and his days be prolonged, yet surely I know 
that it shall be well with them that fear God, which 
fear before Him; but it shall not be well with the 
wicked, neither shall he prolong his days, which are 
20 


230 


Remedial Provision. 


as a shadow ; because he feareth not before God.” 
Now, the circumstances of natural punishments — i.e. 
the injury or suffering produced by a violation of the 
order of nature — are perfectly analogous to what the 
Bible teaches respecting the future punishment of sin. 
Such punishments often follow actions which are 
accompanied with present pleasure and advantage, 
and are often much greater than the pleasure or 
advantage: as when sickness and untimely death 
result from pleasurable vice and intemperance. These 
punishments, also, are often delayed a great while, 
sometimes until after the acts which occasioned them 
are forgotten. They often come suddenly and with 
violence after such delay. There is also a certain 
bound to imprudence and negligence, which once 
passed, the opportunity of mediation is gone and the 
state of retribution begins, when there remains no 
place for repentance and recovery. If the husband- 
man lets his seed-time pass without sowing, the whole 
year is lost to him ; and a certain degree of extrava- 
gance and folly will surely entail poverty and sick- 
ness and disgrace, which no sorrow can avert. In 
perfect accordance with these natural principles do 
the Scriptures warn us against the evil consequences 
of sin, and point us to the hopeless condition of the 
finally impenitent : “ Then shall they call upon me, but 
I will not answer; they shall seek me early, but they 
shall not find me.” 

The mediation of Jesus proposes to deliver us from 
the punishment and guilt of our sins by forgiveness, 
and to recover us from our lapsed condition by the 


Remedial Objection. 


231 


sanctification of our natures. Is there anything in 
nature analogous to this? It is useless to speculate 
as to whether the world might have been constituted 
without the existence of misery or evil. Our specu- 
lations will not change the nature of things. The 
fact is evident that the Creator of the world has per- 
mitted evil. But then He has provided reliefs, and, 
in many cases, perfect remedies; reliefs and remedies 
even for much of that evil which is the result of our 
own misconduct, and which in the regular course of 
nature would have ended in our destruction, but for 
such remedies. Neither sorrow nor reformation will 
repair the injury done by a violation of nature’s laws. 
The principle of remedial mediation must be taken 
advantage of if we would escape the consequences 
of imprudence. If a man fall from a precipice and 
break a limb, sorrow for the fall will not repair it, yet 
it may be remedied by another. People ruin their 
fortunes by extravagance, they bring diseases on 
themselves by excess, they incur the penalties of civil 
laws, nor will sorrow for these past follies and good 
behavior for the future prevent the natural conse- 
quences of these things Men are often forced to 
rely upon the assistance of others in order to recover 
from the effects of their own misconduct. 

Another illustration maybe drawn from patholcgy. 
A bone was not made to be broken, but for use, yet 
it is liable to be broken, and provision has been made 
for its reparation, not by immediate union through the 
ordinary processes of nutrition and growth, but by 
the mediation of a provisional callus, which re-estab- 


4 


232 


Unreasonable Objections. 


lishes the relation of parts and holds them in coher- 
ence until restoration is effected, when it is removed. 
It is, therefore, perfectly consistent with the nature of 
things and the circumstances of mankind that God 
should provide deliverance from spiritual maladies 
and consequences of transgression for all who avail 
themselves of it. So that we may appropriately ask, 
“ Is there no balm in Gilead? Is there no physician 
there? Why, then, is not the health of the daughter 
of my people recovered?” 

The Divine character of Christ, and the spiritual 
nature of the change proposed to be wrought in the 
human soul, are sometimes objected to on the ground 
of their mystery. This is a' childish and unphilo- 
sophic procedure ; for what is there known to science 
which is not mysterious? We take cognizance of 
facts and their relations, but the ultimate nature of 
things, and the reasons even of the simplest facts, are 
beyond the reach of human intellect. It is certainly 
reasonable to attribute Divinity to the Saviour, when 
we reflect on the nature of the work proposed. Who 
can forgive sins but God? Who can renew in the 
soul the principles of original rectitude but the Au- 
thor of its existence? Nor is it more mysterious to 
conceive of God becoming incarnate, and communi- 
cating the power of that divinely-human life to the 
souls of myriads of men, than to conceive of mag- 
netism communicated to a bar of iron, which, without 
loss of virtue itself, may magnetize a thousand needles 




Foolish Objections. 233 

and endow them with properties which they had not 
before. 

Some object to the idea of vicarious or substituted 
atonement as representing God as being indifferent 
whether He punishes the innocent or the guilty. Such 
objectors must either deny the personal government 
of God in the affairs of the world, or they forget that 
vicarious punishment or suffering is a providential 
appointment of every day’s experience. Innocent 
people, in various ways, suffer for the faults of the 
guilty. Men, by their follies, get into difficulties an J 
dangers which would be fatal to them but for the 
help of others, whose assistance requires very great 
pains and labor and suffering on the part of those 
who render it. The objection, therefore, is as much 
against the facts of daily life as against Christianity, 
— which shows its fallacy. Bishop Butler well says 
of all such objectors, “It is indeed a matter of great 
patience to reasonable men to find people arguing in 
this manner, objecting against the credibility of such 
particular things revealed in Scripture, that they do 
not see the necessity or expediency of them. For 
though it is highly right, and the most pious exercise 
of our understanding, to inquire with due reverence 
into the ends and reasons of God’s dispensations, yet 
when these reasons are concealed, to argue from our 
ignorance that such dispensations cannot be from 
God, is infinitely absurd. The presumption of this 
kind of objections seems almost lost in the folly of 
them. And the folly of them is yet greater when 
they are urged, as usually they are, against things in 
20* 


234 Vicarious Suffering honorable . 

Christianity analogous, or like to, those natural dis- 
pensations of Providence which are matter of expe- 
rience.” 

Those who object to the justice of the vicarious 
suffering of Christ do not consider that the sacrifice 
was not a forced but a voluntary one. Christ gave 
himself a ransom for us. His offering was self- 
imposed. By his assumption of our humanity and 
his suffering unto death He has removed the obsta- 
cles out of the way of our salvation. We had no 
claim upon Him, and by no law was He justly con- 
demned. His voluntary acceptance of the work of 
atonement has removed the act altogether out of the 
sphere of law, save that of the law of infinite good- 
ness. It is not manifested justice, but transcendent 
love, on his part, which even Divine justice must 
accept as vicarious and sufficient. 

Again, so far from the idea of vicarious suffering 
being revolting, it commends itself to the moral 
sense of mankind. The chief glory of history is to 
be seen in deeds of self-devotion and heroic self- 
offering. The forlorn hope is always the central 
point of honor. Leonidas at Thermopylae, Tell in 
Switzerland, Winkelried in the Tyrol, and Washing- 
ton in our own land, owe their fame to the nobility 
of self-sacrifice. To follow such examples, and live 
for others, — suffering vicariously for them if need be, 
— is the law and condition of all real greatness and 
goodness in the world. In this also Christ has set 
us an example that we should follow Him. It is the 
vicarious suffering and toil of a mother’s love which 


Vicarious Suffering our Natural Condition. 23 5 

endear it to our hearts. It is this which makes a 
father’s memory honorable. It is the recollection of 
a brother’s or sister’s love, taking on themselves the 
consequences of our faults, averting the penalties of 
our indiscretions, and denying themselves for our 
good, which makes the memory of home so precious. 
Vicarious suffering! It is the natural condition of 
our being! Shall we, then, question the right of God 
to display in highest perfection that which He has 
ordained to be the chief virtue and nobility of his 
creatures? As He is Love itself, can we honor Him 
by denying Him the right or the opportunity to dis- 
play his love to man? 

In a very favorable criticism of fhe first edition ol 
this work by Dr. Whedon (“ Methodist Quarterly 
Review,” Oct., 1872) we find the following : “ The suc- 
ceeding chapter, on the doctrine of the Mediator, is 
fresh from his (the author’s) standpoint, but evades 
the central question how far a satisfaction of one 
man’s sin by another man’s suffering is reconcilable 
with our intuitive sense of absolute justice. Does 
not the same intuitive sense that requires penalty at 
all require that the doer of the sin solely should be 
the sufferer of the penalty ?” To this objection the 
three preceding paragraphs may be sufficient answer, 
yet the following remarks of Dr. Hodge,* in a similar 
strain, may not be inappropriate : “ The substitution 
of the innocent for the guilty, of victims for trans- 
gressors in sacrifice, of one for many, the idea of ex- 


* Systematic Theology, vol. ii, p. 532, 


236 Vicarious Punishment Rational, 

piation by vicarious punishment, has been familiar to 
the human mind in all ages. It has been admitted 
not only as possible, but as rational, and recognized 
as the only method by which sinful men can be 
reconciled to a just and holy God. It is not, there- 
fore, to be admitted that it conflicts with any intuition 
of the reason or of the conscience ; on the contrary, it 
is congenial with both. It is no doubt frequently the 
case that opposition to this doctrine arises from a 
misapprehension of the terms in which it is expressed. 
By guilt many insist on meaning personal criminality 
and ill-desert, and by punishment evil inflicted on the 
ground of such personal demerit. In these senses of 
the words the doctrine of satisfaction and vicarious 
punishment would indeed involve an impossibility. 
The Remonstrants were right in saying that one man 
cannot be good with another’s goodness, any more 
than he can be white with another’s whiteness. And 
if punishment means evil inflicted on the ground of 
personal demerit, then it is a contradiction to say 
that the innocent can be punished. But if guilt ex- 
presses only the relation of sin to justice, and is the 
obligation under which a sinner is placed to satisfy 
its demands, then there is nothing in the nature of 
things, nothing in the nature of God as revealed 
either in his providence or in his word, which forbids 
the idea that this obligation may on adequate grounds 
be transferred from one to another, or assumed by 
one in the place of others.” 

We quote also from Rev. R. Watson’s “ Theolog- 
ical Institutes,” vol. ii. p. 144 : “ Generally speaking, it 


Vicarious Punishment Allowable. 237 

cannot be a matter of difficulty to conceive how the 
authority of a law may be upheld and the justice of 
its administration made manifest, even when its 
penalty is exacted in some other way than the punish- 
ment of the party offending. When the Locrian 
legislator voluntarily suffered the loss of one of his 
eyes to save that of his son condemned by his own 
statutes to lose both, and did this that the law might 
neither be repealed nor exist without efficacy, who 
does not see that the authority of his laws was as 
much — nay, more — impressively sanctioned than if his 
son had endured the whole penalty ? The case, it is 
true, has in it nothing parallel to the work of Christ, 
except in that particular which it is here adduced to 
illustrate ; but it shows that it is not, in all cases, 
necessary for the upholding of a firm government 
that the offender himself should be punished. This 
is the natural .mode of maintaining authority, but 
not, in all cases, the only one ; and in that of the re- 
demption of man we see the wisdom of God in its 
brightest manifestation securing this end, and yet 
opening to man the door of hope.” 

It has often been said that true religion is nothing 
but common sense applied to the affairs of the soul; 
and the more carefully the doctrines of Christianity 
are investigated and compared, the more clearly will 
they be seen to be consistent with the nature of man 
and the order of the world about us. 

If Christ be indeed the Mediator between God and 
man, — i.e. if Christianity be true; if He be indeed 
our Lord, our Saviour, and our God, — the careless 


238 


Warning. 


disregard of tnese high relations, as well as the obsti- 
nate rejection of them, may lead to fatal consequences. 
If neglect of industry and prudence leads to poverty; 
if neglect of remedies and means may issue in death ; 
the neglect of Christ’s mediation may end in eternal 
ruin. Let us, then, be wise while we may. “If thou 
art wise, thou shalt be wise for thyself; but and if 
thou scornest, thou alone shalt bear it.” 




CHAPTER IX. 

THE FAITH-FACULTY IN MAN. 


" For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit ot man 
which is in him? Even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the 
Spirit of God.” St. Paul. 


( 239 ) 






CONTENTS. 

Spiritual Functions in Man — Provision made for these Functions — 
Bible Doctrine of the Holy Spirit and its Influence — The Test of 
Real Christianity — Proof of Spiritual Faculties from the Yearnings 
of the Human Mind — Heathen Oracles, Divination, and Magic — 
These revived in Spiritualism — Effects analogous to Catalepsy, etc. 
— Spiritual Influences taught in Scripture, yet Divine Knowledge 
only from the Divine Spirit — Scripture Condemnation of Divina- 
tion and Necromancy — Reasons for such Condemnation — Divine 
Communications and Mental Exaltation distinguished — Tests of 
Divine Experiences. 


(* 40 ) 


CHAPTER IX. 


THE FAITH-FACULTY IN MAN. 

In the foregoing chapters we considered the spiritual 
world as distinct from the physical, yet manifesting 
itself to man’s intellectual nature by means of laws 
and forces which are peculiar, but whose consistency 
with the arrangement of the visible universe exhibits 
the stamp of the same designing intellect whose traces 
we mark in the ordering of material things. The 
laws of life and mental phenomena evidently pertain 
only to a special order of beings, and require for their 
origin as well as for their elucidation something ex- 
traneous from, and additional to, the matter with 
which it is only temporarily united. Metals and 
stones do not live. The hand, the eye, the ear, and 
other organs, are not conscious of sensation or voli- 
tion, but are merely recipients, conductors, or in- 
struments of sensation and volition. The sensitive, 
willing being is the immaterial soul. We traced the 
functions or faculties of this immaterial nature from 
the most elementary consciousness of its connection 
with corporeal structure, and of physical conditions, 
to its agency upon immaterial ideas; recognizing 
them by Perception, retaining them by Memory, 
combining them by Imagination, comparing and 
deciding respecting them by Judgment Conscience 
21 ( 2 4 i) 


242 


Provision for Spiritual Functions. 


and Volition we considered as the highest functions 
of our spirits, bringing us into relations with the 
spiritual world, and giving us dominion over our own 
powers. We have seen, also, that mankind from the 
earliest ages of the world has been in possession of 
ideas and knowledge which could not have been 
innate, since they are not universal, and which neither 
sensational nor psychological experience is capable 
of communicating, but which claim origin in Divine 
revelation. The same originating power by which 
matter was created and impressed with forces appro- 
priate to its nature — cohesion, gravity, motion, elec- 
tricity, etc., whether these are modifications of a 
single force or otherwise — has also impressed mind 
with ideas and impulses peculiar to itself, and from 
the beginning of the world has ordained means and 
appliances for mental improvement, and remedial 
measures for spiritual restoration. 

We find abundant evidence that man has other 
faculties besides those which relate to the world of 
sense and to the ideas of his own mind. Conscience, 
or the faith-faculty, rises to higher themes than mere 
intellectuality or expediency. It implies a receptivity 
of special spiritual influences. It takes cognizance 
of God, — the invisible Supreme, — and of man’s rela- 
tions to God. Whether we consider it a single 
faculty, or a combination of faculties, its existence 
among men proves the inspirational capacity of the 
soul. There are spiritual functions in human nature 
which render possible the subjective evidence of 
spiritual experience. These spiritual functions find 


Man's Fall and Restoration. 


243 


appropriate provision in supernatural impressions or 
impulses, as well as in intellectual conceptions revealed 
by the Spirit of God. So far as the order of nature 
has been observed, no instance of natural want has 
been met with which is not provided for in the econ- 
omy of the universe. Man’s spiritual necessities and 
yearnings are no exception to this law. The religious 
nature may remain dormant for lack of its appro- 
priate stimulus, or for want of proper conditions of 
development, or it may be entirely blighted or de- 
stroyed, — as the life of a seed may remain dormant 
for years or* become totally extinct; or, being in- 
structed by the Divine word, the soul may be lifted 
heavenwards by penitential desire and faith, and re- 
ceive the quickening, inspiring, and developing energy 
of the Divine Spirit. To this religious nature Kant 
refers when he says that “a rational theology can 
have no existence unless it is founded upon the laws 
of morality.” 

The Bible teaches that man received his spiritual 
faculties from the Divine inbreathing, and, although 
by transgression he lost his original image of right- 
eousness, and the. consciousness of God’s favor, he 
is still capable of receiving Divine communications. 
The fallen creature can still hear the voice of Jehovah, 
and the capability of spiritual restoration is implied 
by all the warnings and promises of Holy Writ. To 
make that restoration possible was the great object 
of the work of redemption by our Lord Jesus Christ, 
which procured for us not only the offer of forgive- 
ness for past guilt, but the gracious aid of the Holy 


244 


Test of Real Christianity. 


Spirit, who is the true quickener and restorer of the 
spiritually dead. Thus it was possible for Enoch to 
have such conscious communings with heaven, and 
so to live up to the behests of his highest nature, that 
it is said of him “he walked with God.” Thus God’s 
Spirit strove with the sinful antediluvians in the days 
of Noah. Thus in every age we read of Divine help 
for human weakness, — the Holy Spirit given to 
write God’s laws upon men’s hearts and bring them 
into communion with himself. When the work of 
redemption was complete, by the offering up of the 
body of Christ once for all, the ministration of the 
Spirit became the principal object of revelation; it 
was therefore fitting that the fullness of time should 
be marked by such a display of spiritual phenomena 
as was witnessed on the day of Pentecost, when the * 
rushing wind and cloven tongues symbolized the 
power communicated from above. (Acts, ii.) This 
manifestation of Divine power was not confined to 
the apostles, but was experienced by all the repre- 
sentatives of the Christian church who were present, 
male and female, young and old. (Acts, ii. 17, 18.) 
Similar occurrences in the early history of the church, 
— as in the case of Cornelius, of the disciples of 
John, etc.,; — and many passages of Scripture, prove 
that the gift of the Holy Spirit is the privilege of all 
real Christians. 

The direct communication of the Divine Spirit to 
the individual heart, or religious nature, is the ex peri- 
mention cmcis of real Christianity. So palpable is 
this influence in those who comply with the condi- 


Effects of Divine Influence . 


245 


tions laid down that the illustrative imagery of the 
Scriptures is of the strongest possible kind. It is 
called a new birth, a new creation, a resurrection 
from the death of sin, a transformation, an indwelling, 
etc., and the strongest sensations are figuratively 
transferred to the spiritual sphere, as in the Psalmist’s 
exclamation, “ O taste and see that the Lord is good : 
blessed is the man that trusteth in Him.” 

The necessary conditions of this Divine influence 
are a voluntary repudiation of impurity and sin, and 
acceptance of righteousness; prayer, or an earnest 
impulse of the spiritual nature towards God; and a 
confident trust in the Divine plan of mediation. The 
essential elements of these conditions may exist in 
minds which in other respects are unenlightened and 
‘superstitious. They were present in the woman who 
ignorantly thought that to touch the hem of Christ’s 
garment would be the proper conduit of supernatural 
power. They existed in many before the coming of 
Christ, and among the heathen also, as in the case 
of Cornelius, the Syrophenician woman, and others. 
Jesus declared that men from all parts of the world 
should be accepted and saved, while those to whom 
He was plainly preached would in many instances 
be cast out. 

The principal effects of the influence of the Holy 
Spirit upon the soul are a consciousness of the Divine 
presence and favor, a conformity of the affections and 
will to the requirements of revelation, and a sort of 
exaltation and energetic action of all the mental 
faculties. This last effect is a consequence of the 
21* 


246 Heathenism a Parody on Truth. 

simplicity and frankness and directness of aim which 
are inseparable from true piety. “If thine eye be 
single, ,, said Christ, “ thy whole body shall be full of 
light.” 

As a matter of course, the reality of such influence, 
in any given case, is a question of experience or of 
testimony. As a sensation cannot be explained in 
words, or as the mental nature has no conception of 
an idea until it enters the sphere of consciousness, so 
an impression upon the spiritual nature must be ex- 
perienced in order to be known. Each must know 
it for himself. Whether others have such experience 
must be judged of by their testimony and their fruits; 
for “by their fruits ye shall know them.” 

Apart from the teachings of the Scriptures and the 
testimony of individual experience, proof of the ex- 
istence of such faculties as we have described, and 
which are presupposed by the biblical doctrine of 
the agency of the Holy Spirit, is found in the his- 
tory of the human mind and its yearnings, through 
all the ages. It is certain that men of every degree 
of intellectual culture, in every period of history, 
have sought for spiritual impulses from a source 
outside of the sphere of the intellect. The dcemon 
of Socrates was not a baseless notion, but had origin 
in the conscious want of an inquiring mind. As the 
memory of the early Divine revelations to the Patri- 
archs could not immediately fade away from the 
minds of men, we find the heathen nations who had 
corrupted the truth not only endeavoring to trans- 
mit the traditions of those communications in poetry 


Revival of Heathenism in Spiritualmn. 247 

and fable, but also seeking themselves to hold com- 
munion with the invisible world, establishing oracles, 
and inventing divination and magic, to support their 
various systems of superstition and idolatry. The 
oracles were the. chapels, or residences, of their spir- 
itual mediums, — generally females, — who were sup- 
posed to be possessed with the spirits of the gods, 
and who went into nervous paroxysms, and recited 
fervid sentences, often without coherence, but some- 
times in regular poetic verse. Magic was called 
either white magic or black magic, according as they 
claimed intercourse with good or bad spirits. Divi- 
nation was the pretended art of foretelling future 
events by demoniacal possession, by mesmeric trance, 
by sacrifices, by lots, or by omens. These phenom- 
ena were regarded by the heathen as effected either 
by the special influence of their gods, or by the spirits 
of dead men, or by a class of spiritual beings inter- 
mediate between the gods and men. A very small 
class of philosophers argued that they were phenom- 
ena natural to the human mind. 

The nineteenth century has witnessed a remarkable 
revival of these practices among civilized nations. 
The rationalistic infidelity of Europe, and the pan- 
theism which it rendered popular, prepared the public 
mind for the reception of the grossest heathenism, 
and caused the delusion to be wide-spread and injuri- 
ous. Nothing, however, which spiritualism (so called) 
has developed has advanced beyond the daily prac- 
tices of the heathen world, both ancient and modern. 
The treatises of Iamblichus and others contain direc- 


248 


Neo-platonic Philosophy . 


tions for producing effects which are a perfect parallel 
to the doings of the magnetizers and spiritualists of 
the present day. 

The following extracts will exhibit this parallelism, 
and suggest the origin of some of the theological 
speculations of modern times: 

“An innate knowledge of the gods is coexistent 
with our very essence; and this knowledge is superior 
to all judgment and deliberate choice, and subsists 
prior to reason and demonstration. . . . 

“The wise, therefore, speak as follows: The soul 
having a twofold life, one being in conjunction with 
body, but the other being separate from all body; 
when we are awake we employ, for the most part, the 
life which is common with the body, except when we 
separate ourselves entirely from it by pure intellectual 
and dianoetic energies. But when we are asleep, we 
are perfectly liberated as it were from certain surround- 
ing bonds, and use a life separated from generation. 
Hence this form of life, whether it be intellectual or 
divine, and whether these two are the same thing, or 
whether each is peculiarly of itself one thing, is then 
excited in us, and energizes in a way conformable to 
its nature. Since, therefore, intellect surveys real 
beings, but the soul contains in itself the reasons of 
all generated natures, it very properly follows that, 
according to a cause which comprehends future 
events, it should have a foreknowledge of them, as 
arranged in their precedaneous reasons. And it 
possesses a divination still more perfect than this, 
when it conjoins the portions of life and intellectual 


Neo-platonic Philosophy. 


249 


energy to the wholes from which it was separated. 
For then it is filled from wholes with all scientific 
knowledge; so as for the most part to attain by its 
conceptions to the apprehension of everything which 
is effected in the world. Indeed, when it is united to 
the gods, by a liberated energy of this kind, it then 
receives the most true plenitudes of intellections, 
from which it emits the true divination of divine 
dreams, and derives the most genuine principles of 
knowledge. But if the soul connects its intellectual 
and divine part with more excellent natures, then its 
phantasms will be more pure, whether they are phan- 
tasms of the gods, or of beings essentially incorporeal, 
or, in short, of things contributing to the truth of 
intelligibles. If, also, it elevates the reasons of gen- 
erated natures contained in it to the gods, the causes 
of them, it receives power from them, and a knowl- 
edge which apprehends what has been and what will 
be; it likewise surveys the whole of time, and is 
allotted the order of providentially attending to and 
correcting them in an appropriate manner. And 
bodies, indeed, that are diseased it heals; but properly 
disposes such things as subsist among men errone- 
ously and disorderly. It likewise frequently delivers 
the discoveries of arts, the distributions of justice, 
and the establishment of legal institutions. . . . 

“Those who energize enthusiastically are not con- 
scious of the state they are in, and they neither live a 
human nor an animal life, according to sense and im- 
pulse, but they exchange this for a certain more divine 
life, by which they are inspired and perfectly possessed.” 


250 


Defense of Heathenism . 


Iamblichus thus answers the objections of Porphyry 
that “a passion of the soul is the cause of divination:” 

“ That ‘ the senses are occupied' therefore tends to 
the contrary of what you say, for it is an indication 
that no human phantasm is then excited. But ‘ the 
fumigations which are introduced' have an alliance to 
divinity, but not to the soul of the spectator. And 
‘ the invocations' do not excite the inspiration of the 
reasoning power, or corporeal passions in the recipi- 
ent, for they are perfectly unknown and arcane, and 
are alone known to the god whom they invoke. But 
that ‘ not all men , but those that are more simple and 
young are more adapted to divination ’ manifests that 
such as these are more prepared for the reception of 
the externally acceding and inspiring spirit.” 

Proclus on Theurgy (quoted in the notes in the 
work referred to) illustrates sympathy by a piece of 
heated paper inflamed by being placed near a lamp, 
without contact, comparing the heated paper to a 
certain relation of inferiors to superiors, and its ap- 
proximation to the lamp to the opportune use of 
things ; the procession of fire to the paper represents 
the presence of divine light to the nature capable of 
its reception, and “Lastly, the inflammation of the 
paper may be compared to the deification of mortals 
and to the illumination of material natures, which 
are afterwards carried upwards, like the enkindled 
paper, from a certain participation of divine seed.”* 

The phenomena referred to are analogous to certain 


* Iamblichus on the Mysteries. 


Angelic Inflnences. 


251 


morbid conditions known to medical science as som- 
nambulism, catalepsy, trance, and other varieties of 
intense sleep, in which, the connection of the mind 
with the external world by means of the bodily 
organs being suspended, the organization of the 
individual is reflected in dreams. As we have seen 
in Chapter VII., the world of selfhood is then pres- 
ent to the mind by the resuscitation of the dormant 
ideas of memory, the obscure suggestions of the 
ccensesthesis, and the vagaries of physically directed 
imagination. Yet, because of its isolation, this dream- 
state is well adapted to real spiritual inspiration, and 
is frequently referred to in the Scriptures as affording 
the opportunity for Divine communications. 

Whether spiritual communications such as are 
pretended — human, or demoniac, or angelic — have 
occurred in modern times is a question which admits 
of grave doubt, since no contribution to the spiritual 
ideas of mankind has yet been promulgated by even 
the most enthusiastic among the votaries of revived 
heathenism. No revelation has yet surpassed “ Moses 
and the prophets.” 

The Scriptures teach plainly the receptive capacity 
of man for spiritual impulses. Angels are represented 
as interested in our welfare and as exerting an influ- 
ence in our behalf. They were frequent ministers of 
revelation as well as of special mercies and judg- 
ments, and are said to be still ministering spirits unto 
the heirs of salvation. Evil spirits, likewise, are rep- 
resented as having an influence on men’s minds, 
inciting to evil and rebellion against God. But 


252 Spiritualism condemned by the Scriptures . 

neither good nor evil angels, nor even the Spirit of 
God himself, are referred to as having an irresistible 
influence. They may incline or draw, but cannot 
force, the soul. As to the impartation of spiritual 
truth, the Bible teaches that none can reveal the 
things of God but the Spirit of God. “For what 
man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of 
man which is in him? even so the things of God 
knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God.” Thus, 
also, Jesus said, “No man knoweth the Father but 
the Son, and he to whom the Son shall reveal Him.” 
To seek a knowledge of the Divine will and of spir- 
itual truth from intercourse with inferior spirits, is to 
reject and turn aside from the revelation which God 
has given. Hence the heathenish practices to which 
we have referred were distinctly forbidden. Moses 
says, “There shall not be found among you any 
one that useth divination, or an observer of times, or 
an enchanter, or a witch, or a charmer, or a consulter 
with familiar spirits, or a wizard, or a necromancer. 
For all that do these things are an abomination unto 
the Lord: and because of these abominations the 
Lord thy God shall drive them out from before thee. 
Thou shalt be perfect with the Lord thy God. For 
these nations, which thou shalt possess, hearkened 
unto observers of times, and unto diviners: but as for 
thee, the Lord thy God hath not suffered thee so to 
do.” (Deut. xviii. 10-13.) In this passage he men- 
tions eight different practices as opposed to the teach- 
ing of Divine revelation, viz., those of— 1st, the user of 
divination, a mode of seeking knowledge of futurity 


The Hunger of the Soul, 


253 


often employed among the heathen, three kinds of 
which — by arrows or rods, by images, and by the 
entrails of animals — are mentioned by Ezekiel, and 
denounced as rebellion against God; 2d, the observer 
of times, or dreams; 3d, the enchanter, or serpent- 
charmer; 4th, the witch, or sorceress, who divined 
by means of exhilarating and poisonous drugs, like 
the mephitic gas of Delphi, or the modern magician’s 
incense; 5th, the charmer by the power of song, 
which was often resorted to as a means of exalting 
nervous influence; 6th, the consulter with familiar 
spirits; 7th, the wizard, or magician, who was sup- 
posed to possess magic arts which gave supernat- 
ural knowledge; 8th, the necromancer, or con- 
sulter of the spirits of the dead. Throughout the 
Scriptures, a resort to such abnormal excitements, or 
to communications with spirits, either real or sup- 
posed, for the purpose of gaining knowledge of the 
future or of the spiritual world, is plainly and strongly 
condemned. The reasons of this condemnation are 
both intellectual and moral. The responses of spirit- 
ism are fragmentary, fanciful, contradictory, and 
deceptive, like the imagination and mutterings of a 
man intoxicated, and the result is darkness and in- 
capacity of mind and instability of reason. “When 
they shall say unto you, Seek unto them that have 
familiar spirits, and unto wizards that peep, and that 
mutter: should not a people seek unto their God? 
for the living to the dead? To the law and to the 
testimony: if they speak not according to this word, 
it is because there is no light in them. And they 
22 


254 Elevation is not Inspiration. 

shall pass through it, hardly bestead and hungry; and 
it shall come to pass, that when they shall be hungry, 
they shall fret themselves, and curse their king and 
their God, and look upward. And they shall look 
unto the earth; and behold trouble and darkness, 
dimness of anguish; and they shall be driven to 
darkness.” (Isa. viii. 19-22.) This passage exhibits 
the mental effects of all such pursuits. 

The superstitious arts and practices alluded to, 
however unsatisfactory or wrong, are nevertheless 
proofs and illustrations of the fact that man has con- 
sciousness of the possession of a spiritual nature, 
capable of being acted upon by impulses of a spirit- 
ual sort. Hideous distortions of the truth though 
they are, yet they have a foundation in our human 
nature. Properly interpreted, they are agonizing and 
pitiable expressions of the necessity of the soul wan- 
dering in darkness and feeling after God. They are 
manifestations of want which can be truly satisfied 
nowhere save in the provision which God has made 
for the soul. 

The tendencies of modern thought require us to 
give prominence to the scriptural doctrine of a real 
communion between the soul of a true Christian and 
the Spirit of God; but we must be careful to discrimi- 
nate between the communications of the Divine 
Spirit and the exercise of our own faculties. The 
superior faculties of man’s nature will naturally in- 
fluence the inferior, but we may distinguish between 
these effects and the cause which produces them. In 
the extraordinary revelations to the prophets, pre- 


The Scriptural Test of Spiritual Truth. 255 

paratory to Christ’s coming, there were frequent 
accompaniments of ecstasies and trances, and peculiar 
elevations of mind, and special eloquence, not the 
same in all, nor at all times. These effects and 
accompaniments of central truth impressed the 
senses of observers often more than the truth itself, 
so that persons of lively or overheated imaginations 
were sometimes regarded as persons inspired. Thus 
the heathen priests and oracles found a ready soil 
for the growth of their systems, and their frenzies, 
trances, and clairvoyance, imitating and exaggerating 
the natural effects of Divine inspiration, led away 
men’s minds from truth to childish superstition and 
heathenism. Even when a warm and enthusiastic 
fancy is employed on religious subjects, and rises to 
a high pitch of excitement, we must not conclude 
that it is necessarily impressed by the Spirit of God. 
Many instances have been known of persons who 
have been most eloquent and thrilling in preaching 
and exhortation, and ardent in prayers, who were yet 
destitute of all true piety towards God or humanity 
towards men. The witness of God’s Spirit with our 
spirits is addressed to our consciousness in a manner 
peculiarly its own. It is not dependent upon the 
varying moods or feelings of our minds, although it 
may so impress the recipient as to beget even intense 
excitement. Christians may have ecstatic raptures 
and dreams, because they are men. But a real 
Christian may be assured, like the Psalmist, that even 
if both heart (or soul) and flesh fail, — if both bodily 
and mental faculties should be diseased or deranged, 


256 Tests of Spiritual Experience. 

— God is the strength of his heart, and his portion 
forever. 

The difference between imagination and the con- 
sciousness of Divine favor is a subject of great im- 
portance, as a check to enthusiasm on the one hand, 
and confirmatory of a humble Christian faith on the 
other. Imagination is, as we have seen (page 207), a 
faculty of the spiritual nature by which we combine 
ideas previously received. Influential as it is, and most 
useful when well directed, it cannot create. Its office 
is wholly intellectual, or pertains to the sphere of 
ideas. Its combinations may always be represented 
in words or pictures. No state of consciousness can 
be thus represented. Every conscious sensation or 
feeling is a matter of experience known only to its 
possessor, and cannot be explained to another. Here 
lies the fallacy of those skeptical minds who seek for 
verbal explanations and logical formulae in every 
sphere of religious investigation. As the conscious- 
ness of physical sensation, like the taste of salt or 
sugar, or of mental states, like memory or volition, 
or of spiritual qualities, as love, gratitude, etc., is its 
own evidence, so likewise is the experience of the 
work of the Divine Spirit. As certainly as the an- 
swering telegram of a friend with whom we correspond 
at a distance by means of electric wires is the reply 
to the prayer of faith from a humble, penitent heart. 
It is a question altogether of experiment, and not 
of intellectual imagination or deductive reasoning. 
Again, imagination may be elevating to the intel- 
lectual nature; it may produce a glow of feeling, 


Tests of Spiritual Experience. 257 

such as is produced by music or oratory or by a con- 
templation of the starry heavens ; but it cannot trans- 
form the moral nature — it cannot change the soul 
from a sinful to a holy state. The consciousness of 
Divine favor communicated by the Divine Spirit is 
hallowing as well as elevating, and the soul is con- 
scious of it, so as to realize with the Psalmist : “ As 
far as the east is from the west, so far hath God re- 
moved my transgressions from me.” 

We may readily distinguish between a true child 
of the Spirit and a presumptuous self-deceiver by 
applying the scriptural test, “By their fruits ye shall 
know them.” For all who are truly of God do the 
works of God, and the fruits of the Spirit are mani- 
fest in them: “love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentle- 
ness, meekness, faith, temperance, charity.” If we are 
so happy as to have such a blessed consciousness of 
spiritual experience as to call God our Father, — or, 
to use the expressive Syriac word of the apostle, 
“Abba,” a word easy even to stammering childhood, 
— and find the above-mentioned fruits and graces in 
our souls, the Spirit thus manifested to us will “seal 
us unto the day of redemption,” “quicken our mortal 
bodies,” and “reward our faithful use of his few gifts 
here with plentiful effusions of glory hereafter.” 


22* 

































































. 




■ 










CHAPTER X. 

THE RESURRECTION. 


“This corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal put on 
immortality.” St. Paul. 


(259) 


CONTENTS, 


Idea of Resuscitation not innate, nor taught by Nature — Scriptures 
teach a Bodily Resurrection — Ecclesiastical History of the Doctrine 
— Variety of Opinions from Alleged Difficulties — Theory of Evolu- 
tion — Views of Whately and Drew — A True Theory must embrace 
all Past Cases and the Predicted Change of the Living — The Small 
Amount of Matter really belonging to our Bodies — Power of Vital 
Affinities gives Probability to the Idea of Resurrection — No Real 
Analogy in Nature — Analogies confirmatory of the Predicted 
. Change in our Future Bodies. 


( 260 ) 


CHAPTER X. 


THE RESURRECTION. 

The idea of the resuscitation of the dead will not, 
we think, be claimed as an intuition by even the most 
zealous advocates for that mode of accounting for the 
origin of our thoughts. And it is equally certain 
that there is nothing in nature capable of communi- 
cating such an idea to our minds. The transforma- 
tion of the insect tribes, the growth of a plant from 
its seed, etc., although useful illustrations of the 
difference between one state of existence and another, 
are quite different from a resurrection from a state of 
death. It is true that in every age persons seemingly 
dead have revived; but they were only apparently, 
and not really, dead. We claim, therefore, that the 
idea must have originated by revelation, and is, 
therefore, true. 

The number of passages in the Old Testament 
Scriptures which embody this idea shows that it was 
a familiar topic of thought in the days of primitive 
truth. 

Job declares, “I know that my redeemer liveth, 
and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the 
earth: and though after my skin worms destroy this 

( 261 ) 


262 


A Patriarchal Truth. 


body, yet in my flesh shall I see God: whom I shall 
see for myself, and mine eyes shall behold, and not 
another; though my reins be consumed within me.”* 

The antiquity of the book of Job renders this pas- 
sage very remarkable as a record of the patriarchal 
and primitive revelation. Our translation of these 
words has passed through a fiery ordeal of criticism; 
yet, so far as spirit and meaning are concerned, it has, 
we think, received no improvement. Some regard this 
passage as a strong expression of confidence in a 
return to worldly prosperity ; but from the context it 
is evident that Job was in expectation of a speedy 
death, and desired these words engraved on the rock 
as an epitaph. 

Prof. T. Lewis, although evidently inclined to give 
the text a spiritualistic interpretation, remarks, “Job 
says, ‘ my redeemer,’ my next of kin; but the whole 
spirit of the solemn passage shows that it must have 
a wider significance. It is the universal Goel, the 
next of kin to humanity. The redeemer is regarded 
as standing in some mysterious relation to us all, as 
‘the last man’ of the family, who stands over the dust 
of dying generations, and who will avenge our cause 
against the cruel murderer of our race.” 

Job’s reference to a redeemer or avenger on the 
eve of his expected death, seems to us an unanswer- 
able proof that it is an expression of personal faith in 
the resurrection of his flesh. “The word is very 
emphatical [Goel], for it signifieth a kinsman, near 


Job, xix. 25-27. 


Old Testament Teaching. 263 

allied unto him, of his own flesh, that will restore 
him to life.”* 

In II. Kings, iv. 32-37, we have an account of the 
prophet Elisha restoring the Shunammite’s son to 
life; and in II. Kings, xiii. 21, we read of a dead man 
living again on touching the bones of a buried 
prophet. These are plain instances of the idea of a 
resurrection in Old Testament times. 

Refer also to Ps. xvi. 9, 10: “My flesh also shall 
rest in hope. For thou wilt not leave my soul in 
hell; neither wilt thou suffer thine Holy One to see 
corruption.” Ps. xxx. 3: “O Lord, thou hast brought 
up my soul from the grave.” Ps. xlix. 15 : “ God will 
redeem my soul from the power of the grave.” Isa. 

xxv. 8 : “ He will swallow up death in victory.” Isa. 

xxvi. 19: “Thy dead men shall live, together with 
my dead body shall they arise. Awake and sing, ye 
that dwell in dust: for thy dew is as the dew of herbs, 
and the earth shall cast out the dead.” Ezek. xxxvii. 
1-12, — the vision of the valley of dry bones: “I will 
open your graves, and cause you to come up out of 
your graves,” etc. Dan. xii. 2 : “ Many of them that 
sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake,” etc. Hos. 
xiii. 14: “I will ransom them from the power of the 
grave; I will redeem them from death: O death, I 
will be thy plagues; O grave, I will be thy destruc- 
tion,” etc. 

We are aware that some of these passages refer 
chiefly to a restoration from temporal calamity; but 


Legh’s Critica Sac«-a, 


264 New Testament Teaching. 

the foundation for such reference is the idea of a 
• resurrection. “An image which is assumed in order 
to express anything in the way of allegory, whether 
poetical or prophetical, must be an image commonly 
known and understood, otherwise it will not answer 
the purpose for which it is assumed.”* 

The doctrine of the resurrection of the dead is 
plainly and frequently taught and alluded to in the 
New Testament. Christ himself, and the apostles, 
often referred to it as a fundamental truth of the 
Christian religion; and the raising of Jairus’s daugh- 
ter, of the son of the widow of Nain, of Lazarus, and 
of the saints whose bodies arose at the time of the 
crucifixion of Jesus, were demonstrations of its possi- 
bility. The resurrection of Christ himself is asserted 
to be the model of the future resurrection of his 
people. He is “the first-fruits of them that slept,” 
as the Jewish first-fruits were a pledge and specimen 
of the coming harvest. He is to “change our vile 
bodies, and make them like unto his own glorious 
body, according to the working whereby He is able 
to subdue all things unto himself.” Vast and myste- 
rious as it will be, it is not deemed incredible by 
Christians “that God should raise the dead;” and so 
important is this doctrine to the integrity of the 
Christian scheme that it is said the apostles “preached 
Jesus and the resurrection.” 

In the original Greek of the New Testament, four 
words are used to express this rising up again of the 


Wemyss’s Symbol Dictionary. 


History of Opinion in the Church. 265 

dead body, — dvaVra<r^, and its corresponding verb, 
di/tary/it; 'iyepaiq and iyeipio. The first of these is used 
thirty-eight times, the second thirty-one times, the 
third once, and the fourth seventy-five times, where 
the context requires us to associate it with the resus- 
citation of the dead body. They are also used, to 
express the new life of the regenerated, or a spiritual 
resurrection from sin to holiness, the first three times, 
the second once, and the fourth six times. The idea 
of a spiritual resurrection, however, is based upon 
and implies a literal one ; and the apostle expressly 
combats the views of those who restrict the resurrec- 
tion to the soul and affirm that the resurrection was 
past already, thereby overthrowing the faith of some. 
(II. Tim. ii. 18.) 

At a very early period in the history of the Chris- 
tian church a speculating tendency was observable, 
growing out of the teachings of Grecian — especially 
the Platonic — philosophy. The Apostle Paul speaks 
of it in his epistles, and particularly warns Timothy 
to avoid it. I. Tim. vi. 20. The Docetae, as they 
were called, were the forerunners of the Gnostics, 
and were especially opposed by the Apostle John. 
I. John, i. 1-3, ii. 22, iv. 2; II. John, 7. Ignatius 
also wrote against them subsequently in his epistles 
to the Ephesians and to the Smyrnians. They main- 
tained the divinity of Christ, but volatilized his 
human nature into a mere phantom, teaching that 
He acted and suffered not in reality but in appear- 
ance. What Docetism did in the doctrine concerning 
Christ alone, the more completely developed system 
23 


2 66 History of Opinion in the Church . 

of Gnosticism carried out in its whole spiritualizing 
tendency. It opposed the spiritualistic to the literal, 
the ideal to the real, in its interpretation of Scripture 
truth. To resolve history into myths, to dissipate 
positive doctrines by speculation, and thus make an 
aristocratic distinction between those who only be- 
lieve and those who know; to overrate knowledge , 
especially that which is ideal and speculative in reli- 
gion, — these were the principal features of Gnos- 
ticism. It - is necessary to refer to this tendency 
to speculation in order to appreciate the force and 
applicability of the expressions of the early Christian 
authors. 

The Apostles’ Creed was perhaps the earliest ex- 
pression (symbol) of the Christian faith in a condensed 
form. Ambrose, in the fourth century, attributes 
it to the twelve' apostles. The phrase in the creed, 
“The resurrection of the body,” before a . d . 600 read, 
“The resurrection of the flesh;” and “it is said of 
the ancient recitation that when they came to the 
clause, ‘ Credo carnis resuirectionem ,’ it was recited 
with a gesture, the hand pointing to the body, as 
though each one declared for himself, ‘I believe in the 
resurrection of this body.’”* 

This testimony is important, as showing that at 
that early day the resurrection of the flesh was re- 
garded as synonymous with the resurrection of the 
dead. 

Most of the Fathers believed in the resuscitation 


* Noldius, Concord. Heb. Part,, quoted by Prof. Lewis. 


History of Opinion in the Church. * 267 

of the body, and of the very same body which man 
possessed while on earth. Clement of Rome, sup- 
posed to have been a fellow-laborer with Paul (Phil, 
iv. 3), and one of Rome’s first bishops, in his First 
Epistle to the Corinthians argues largely in its favor 
from the analogies of nature, — the change of day and 
night, seed and fruit, the phoenix, etc. Ignatius and 
Polycarp, in their epistles, also refer to the same doc- 
trine. Justin Martyr (a.d. 89) also adopts the literal 
interpretation, and shows that Christianity differs from 
the systems of either Pythagoras or Plato, in that it 
teaches not only the immortality of the soul, but also 
the resurrection of the body. Athenagoras (last half 
of the second century) argues for it from a variety of 
considerations, and answers the objection drawn from 
the elements of one organism entering into the com- 
position of another, by advancing the idea that at the 
resurrection all things will be restored. Theophilus 
(Bishop of Antioch, a.d. 170) uses similar language. 
Irenaeus (the disciple of Polycarp, a.d. 177) also 
asserts the identity of the future with the present 
body, and appeals to the analogous revivification (not 
new creation) of separate organs of the body in some 
of the miraculous cures performed by Christ, — eg. 
of the blind man, and the man with the withered 
hand. Tertullian (a.d. 160) wrote a work entitled 
De Resurrectione Carnis , in which he made use of 
preceding arguments, and acutely pointed out the 
intimate connection between body and soul in the 
present life; using this to strengthen his position. 

The Alexandrian school of writers was distinguished 


268 History of Opinion in the Church. 

by a strong leaning to speculation and allegorical 
interpretation of Scripture. Clement of Alexandria 
( a . d . 212) merely touches upon this doctrine, without 
discussing it; but, as in one place he represents the 
future deliverance of the soul from the fetters of the 
body as most desirable, his orthodoxy has been ques- 
tioned. His disciple, Origen (died a.d. 254), main- 
tained that we may put our trust in Christ without 
believing the resurrection of the body, provided we 
hold fast the immortality of the soul. Nevertheless 
he defended the resurrection against Celsus and the 
Arabians, but rejected the identity of the bodies, and 
argued that every body must be adapted to its cir- 
cumstances, — the heavenly state demanding heavenly 
bodies, like Moses and Elias. 

The Gnostics believed in the immortality of the 
soul, but their notions concerning matter made them 
shrink from the idea of a reunion of the body with 
the soul, and led them to reject the doctrine of a 
resurrection. Thus Apelles maintained that the work 
of Christ had reference only to the soul, and rejected 
a resurrection of the body. The false teachers of 
Arabia, whom Origen combated, asserted that both 
soul and body fall into a sleep at death, from which 
they will not awake till the last day. 

Methodius (Bishop of Lycia, died a.d. 311) com- 
bated Origen’s idealistic doctrine of the resurrection ; 
yet several of the Eastern theologians adopted it, as 
Gregory of Nazianzum (Bishop of Constantinople, 
died a.d. 390) and Gregory of Nyssa (a.d. 394), who 
considered the soul as the breath of the Almighty, 


History of Opinion in the Church. 269 

and deliverance from the body as the most essential 
point of future happiness. Chrysostom (a.d. 344), 
though asserting the identity of the body, kept close 
to the doctrine of St Paul, and maintained a differ- 
ence between the present and the future body. Epi- 
phanius (a.d. 404), Theophilus of Alexandria, and 
Jerome (died a.d. 420) were representatives of the 
anti-Origenist party. The latter went so far as to say 
that in the resurrection even our hair and teeth will 
not be wanting. Augustine (Bishop of Hippo, died 
a.d. 430), in the earlier part of his life, believed in a 
literal resurrection, but endeavored to make it accord 
with Platonic and Alexandrian views.* In after-life 
he adopted more sensuous notions, and entered upon 
the question of the stature, age, etc. of the resurrec- 
tion bodies. 

The opinion of Origen was condemned by the 
decisions of synods, after which a controversy ensued 
between Eutychius, Patriarch of Constantinople, and 
Gregory the Great, Bishop of Rome (died a.d. 604) 
as to whether the resurrection body was “impalpa- 
bilis;” and also a discussion between the Mono- 
physitic Philoponites and the Cononites whether the 
resurrection was to be considered as a new creation 
of matter or as a mere transformation. This latter 
grew out of the Aristotelian principle that matter 
and form are inseparable, and are both destroyed 
with the death of the body. One view condemned 


* “ In ccelestibus nullo caro, sed corpora simplicia et lucida .” — De 
Fide et Symb. 

23 * 


270 


Modern Views of Resurrection. 


as Origenistic was that the resurrection body will be 
spherical, as being most perfect; another, that the 
bodies will at some future time be annihilated. 

From the time of Jerome and Augustine, the 
resurrection of the body with all its component parts 
was regarded as the orthodox doctrine of the Catholic 
church. The Bogomiles, Cathari, and others, how- 
ever, revived the notion of the Gnostics, who, looking 
on matter as the seat of sin, rejected the idea of a 
resurrection. The ecclesiastical doctrine was defended 
by Moneta (of Cremona, a.d. 1220), a Dominican 
monk, and was further developed into particulars by 
the scholastics, especially by Thomas Aquinas (a.d. 
1224), with many strange conjectures respecting the 
nature of the resurrection body. 

In more recent times this doctrine has given rise 
to various opinions. Dr. Priestley endeavored to re- 
concile the scriptural doctrine of a resurrection with 
the philosophical idea of immortality, by supposing 
that there is a particular organ of the soul which 
develops itself in the hour of death. Samuel Drew 
revived the notion of the Jewish rabbins that there 
is a particular part of the body which is indestructible, 
and from which the future body will be developed, 
like a plant from a seed. Swedenborg rejected the 
doctrine of the resurrection, as founded upon too 
literal an interpretation of Scripture, teaching that in 
fact the resurrection and the general judgment have 
already taken place, and that after death men con- 
tinue to live as men (the righteous as angels). Prof. 
Bush teaches the development or evolution of a 


Cause of Variety of Ophiions. 271 

spiritual body from the natural one at death, which 
he terms the resurrection. 

Archbishop Whately and Dr. Hitchcock have 
maintained that the future body will not consist of 
the same particles, but of the same che-mical elements, 
arranged in the same form, and argue its identity 
from the change of particles which is continually 
going on in our bodies during life without changing 
their identity. 

The creeds or summaries of doctrine of modern 
churches or organized religious bodies uniformly 
contain a distinct avowal of their belief in a bodily 
resurrection. Perhaps the only exceptions are the 
Swedenborgians, the Shakers, and the Spiritualists. 

The variety of opinions respecting the resurrection, 
among those who admit the Divine authority of the 
Scriptures, arises from a consideration of the physical 
difficulties alleged against it, such as the entire disso- 
lution of the body into its original elements, the 
dissemination of these elements throughout the world, 
and the entering of these elements into the bodies of 
ofcher animals or men. 

Those who hold the most literal idea of a bodily 
resurrection believe that each particle is under Divine 
supervision, and is preserved from forming any essen- 
tial part of other organized bodies until its reunion 
with the spirit. To a believer in a personal Creator, 
such as the Scriptures reveal, there is no incredibility 
in this view. The Divine omnipotence and the Divine 
superintendence answer all objections. A laudable 
desire, however, to remove the difficulties out of the 


272 


Traces of the Idea in Ancient Times. 

way of faith encourages the adoption of any theory 
which seems to meet the requirements of Scripture 
language and at the same time avoids the objections 
to which allusion has been made. 

The Swedenborgian idea, and that of Prof. Bush, 
respecting the evolution of a spiritual or rarefied 
body at death, contradict totally the idea of a resur- 
rection, which is the living again of the dead body. 
This idea, as we have seen, existed from primitive 
times, and entered into the traditions of all nations. 
The raising of the body of Osiris in the Egyptian 
mythology, the metempsychosis of the Eastern na- 
tions, the Grecian story of Proserpine and Ceres, with 
the rites and mysteries founded upon it, and the fable 
of the Phoenix, are but variously colored pictures of 
this truth as received from the fathers of the human 
race. Plato declared that “it is an original tradition 
that souls go from hence, and again return hither and 
arise from the dead.”* The biblical record refers to 
this idea so often and so emphatically as to admit of 
no question as to its meaning. The Apostle Paul 
could not condemn the idea of evolution more plainly 
than he has done in II. Timothy, ii. 18. No method 
of interpretation which would not be fatal to all the 
distinctive ideas of revelation can apply the term 
resurrection to anything else than the body which 
dies and is buried in the grave. 

The view of Archbishop Whately, Prof. Hitchcock, 
and others, that the resurrection will consist in re- 


* T. Lewis’s Platonic Theology, p 331. 


/ 


Theories of Identity . 


2/3 


building a new body from the same chemical elements, 
arranged after the same laws, and in the same form, 
but with great change of properties, commends itself 
to scientific men by its conformity with chemical and 
physiological laws; yet it is a serious objection that 
the idea of a real resurrection is lost sight of in this 
theory. It is rather a theory of a new creation than 
of a resurrection. The adherents of this view, how- 
ever, reply that the Bible was not given to gratify 
scientific curiosity, or to explain the manner of phe- 
nomena, and that the doctrine of the resurrection of 
the body simply means the reunion of the soul with 
a material body. 

The opinion of Mr. Samuel Drew, adopted by 
Dr. A. Clarke and others, has had quite an extensive 
acceptance. This claims that there is a certain part 
of the body which is essential to the identity of the 
body, and which is indestructible, and from which 
the resurrection body will be developed. Mr. Drew 
says, “Some radical particles must be fixed within 
us, which constitute our sameness through all the 
mutations of life; and which, remaining in a state of 
incorruptibility, shall put forth a germinating power 
beyond the grave, and be the germ of our future 
bodies.” He sums up the various theories of per- 
sonal identity as follows: I. Those particles which 
compose the body of an infant. 2. The numerical 
particles which compose our bodies at any given 
period. 3. The modification of parts. 4. The par- 
ticles composing our bodies at death. 5. The majority 
of the particles deposited in the earth. 6. The prin- 


274 


Dr. A. Clarke's Theory. 


ciple referred to above. He argues against the first 
from the changes it undergoes, and the injustice of its 
participating in the consequences of actions it could 
not have performed. As to the second, he argues 
that identity cannot be transferred from one system of 
atoms to another without contradiction, and therefore 
that identity is not in numerical particles. On the 
third he shows that sameness of material can never 
consist in the arrangement of parts. He argues 
against the fourth as presuming that no identity of the 
body existed before. On the fifth he says, “ If identity 
cannot consist either in the union of original and 
acquired particles, or in particles which are wholly 
acquired, then the identity of the body cannot con- 
sist in the majority of those particles which are 
deposited.” 

Dr. A. Clarke coincided with the opinion of Mr. 
Drew, and found some illustration of it in the Rab- 
binical use of the Chaldee word nb (Luz), by which 
they “signify a certain bone in the human skeleton 
which is incorruptible, and out of which they suppose 
the resurrection body will be formed.” 

Much of the matter connected with our bodies 
during life is doubtless foreign and not essential to 
their identity. Nine-tenths of the human body con- 
sists of water, — as has been shown by the weight of a 
corpse which had been desiccated in an oven, — and 
of the remaining tenth part, much is material in a 
state of decay, having been used by the vital pro- 
cesses, and now effete, or being cast off. So that but a 
very small proportion of the matter of our bodies can 


Nascent Matter only essential . 


275 


really be said to be our own. These facts add much 
to the plausibility of Mr. Drew’s theory. The prin- 
cipal objection to it is that it is a theory of vegeta- 
tion or development, and not of resurrection, and 
thereby fails to meet the requirements of the biblical 
idea. 

No idea of the resurrection can be true or scriptural 
which will fail in any essential respect to apply to the 
resurrection body of Christ, or to those instances of 
resurrection related in the Bible, or to the changed 
bodies of the living who shall remain on earth at the 
general resurrection. The apostle says, “We which 
are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord 
shall not prevent [that is, according to the old Eng- 
lish sense of the word, go before, or have preference 
over '] them which are asleep.” So that whatever 
view we may adopt should include all these instances. 
The evolution theory and the opinions of Whately 
and Drew all fail to apply to them. 

We have seen that of the total amount of material 
associated with our bodies, physiology shows a very 
small part only to be essential to their integrity.* 


* Dr. Beale, a most eminent English authority in histology, or 
the science of organic tissues, has succeeded in demonstrating, as he 
believes, the difference between living and formed structure. He 
says, “ Some years ago I obtained evidence which convinced me that' 
the substance of the bodies of all things living was composed of 
matter in two states; and I showed that the truly vital phenomena, 
nutrition, growth , and multiplication, were manifested by one of the 
two kinds of matter, while the other was the seat of physical and 
chemical changes only. From observation, I was led to conclude 
that, of any living thing, but a part of the matter of which it was 


276 


Probability from Vital Affinities. 


That matter only which is in a nascent condition, or 
which is being applied to vital use, can be said to 
belong to our bodies. Supposing this small part to 
be indestructible, many of the objections to a resur- 
rection drawn from the nourishment of other organ- 
ized bodies will be removed, for both animals and 
vegetables are built up from the decomposition of 
other beings. 

But even on the supposition of the complete reso- 
lution of bodily matter into its chemical elements, 
there is no scientific improbability against a resurrec- 
tion, in the literal sense of that word. For each 
substance in nature has its own special affinities, and 
the attraction between the plastic power (or forming 
spirit) of an organized being and the atomic material 
elements pertaining to it at any particular period, is 
sufficient to change and overcome the ordinary laws 
of matter and destroy chemical combinations. With 
the knowledge which science gives us of the supe- 
riority of the laws of life to all other affinities, and 
of the power of vitality to remove its appropriate 
matter from all sorts of combination whatever, there 
is no scientific impossibility in the revelation which 
announces that the spirit shall come again to claim 
its own appropriate bodily material. There is no 
more improbability in a resurrection than in the 

constituted was really living at any moment. In the case of adult 
forms of the higher animals and man, indeed, only a very small por- 
tion of the total quantity of their body-matter is alive at any period of 
existence.” — Life - theories : their Influence upon Religious Thought . 
By Lionel S. Beale, M.D., F.R.S., etc. 


No Analogy of a Resurrection. 


*77 


union of matter and spirit at first. If vegetation was 
known only in theory, it would be more difficult to 
believe in the production of sixty or one hundred 
grains from one grain than to credit a resurrection. 
The suspension of vitality for two or three thousand 
years, as in a seed taken from the hand of an Egyp- 
tian mummy, which, on being planted in the ground, 
produced fruit, is just as difficult to understand as the 
resurrection of the body. We have indications of 
similar suspension of vitality in the sleep of plants 
and animals and in hibernation. Infusoria have been 
dried and resuscitated a number of times without 
losing their vitality, and the hydra and other polyps 
may be cut into an indefinite number of pieces and 
yet live. Such instances show the strength of the 
forming principle, and its power to renew its physical 
manifestations; but, although they tend to confirm our 
faith in the probability of a resurrection, they are not 
analogous. There are no analogies to it in nature. 
The change from a chrysalis to a butterfly, and other 
metamorphoses, are merely instances of developmental 
epochs, not of resurrection. The decomposing seed 
which gives rise to the plant is never severed from 
the vital principle or germ. The idea of restoration 
from a state of real death is so foreign to all our 
knowledge that we are warranted in assuming that 
the idea would never have occurred to our minds but 
for Divine revelation. The only real analogies of a 
resurrection known to man are the historical illustra- 
tions given in the Bible. 

Yet although there are no real analogies in nature, 

24 


278 Some Illustrations of a Resurrection. 

— no instances of actual revivification other than 
those revealed, — there are hints and illustrations 
which may serve to confirm our faith. “Ask the 
furrows of the field, and they shall tell thee. For 
‘except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, 
it abideth alone; but if it die, it bringeth forth much 
fruit.’ The parts of the seed cannot spring afresh 
till they have been dissolved. It is true, the husband- 
man soweth only bare grain, but it arises ‘clothed 
upon’ with a beautiful verdure. And ‘if God so 
clothe the grass of the field,’ how much more shall 
He clothe your mortal bodies with a glorious immor- 
tality, O ye of little faith? But why need we take 
the compass of a year? Every twenty-four hours 
there is a rehearsal, in nature, of man’s death and 
resurrection. Every evening, the day, with its works, 
dies into darkness and the shadow of death. All 
colors fade, all beauty vanishes, all labor and motion 
cease, and every creature, veiled in darkness, mourns, 
in solemn silence, the interment of the world. Who 
would not say, ‘It is dead, — it shall not rise’! Yet, 
wait only a few hours, in faith and patience, and this 
dead and entombed earth, by the agency of heaven 
upon it, shall burst asunder the bars of that sepulchral 
darkness in which it was imprisoned, and ‘arise, and 
be enlightened, and its light shall come; the day- 
spring from on high shall visit it, and destroy the 
covering cast over all people,’ and array univeisal 
nature with a robe of glory and beauty, raising 
those that sleep, to behold themselves and the 
world changed from darkness to light, and calling 


Resurrection the Triumph of the Supernatural. 279 

them up to give glory to God and think of the 
resurrection.”* 

The future resurrection of the dead will manifest 
the complete triumph of revealed truth. It will be 
the gathering together in one of the things in heaven 
and the things in earth, — the complete union and 
fusion of the natural and the supernatural. It is there- 
fore the crowning miracle of the Scriptures, and to it 
all other miracles testify. The resurrection power of 
Jesus was seen in all his miraculous cures. The 
revivification (not new creation) of separate organs 
of the body is analogous to the resurrection of the 
whole body, as in the cure of the blind, and of the 
man with the withered hand. But most of all was 
supernatural power displayed in Christ’s own resur- 
rection. By this was He declared to be “the Son of 
God with power.” In his Divine nature dwelt the 
essential power of life. No man took his life without 
his consent. He had power to lay it down, and He 
had power to take it again. His resurrection proves 
his ability “to subdue all things unto himself.” The 
prophets of the Old Testament, as the messengers 
and heralds of the Saviour, had delegated power 
to work occasional miracles, but in Jesus, supreme 
supernatural power was his mormal state, for “in Him 
dwelt all the fullness of the Godhead bodily.” The 
final resurrection of the dead will be the completion 
of his work of redemption, and the “manifestation 
of the sons of God.” 


Bishop Horne’s Sermon on the Resurrection. 


280 The Same Body with Different Qualities. 

The Scriptures represent the future resurrection 
body as greatly changed from the condition of the 
present body. St. Paul affirms that Christ shall 
“change our vile bodies, that they may be made like 
unto his own glorious body,” and in another place he 
contrasts the buried body with its resurrection state, 
saying, “ It is sown in corruption, it is raised in incor- 
ruption; it is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory; 
it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power; it 
is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual 
body. . . . For this corruptible must put on incor- 
ruption, and this mortal must put on immortality.” To 
these representations science affords many analogies. 
The various instances of developmental change are 
such analogies: as the difference between a seed and 
the plant and flovrer which spring from it; the differ- 
ence between an embryo and a child or an adult; the 
changes of the insect tribes, etc. It is well known 
in modern chemistry that many substances may exist 
in two or more physical states or conditions, called 
allotropic states. In these conditions the same sub- 
stance may possess very different physical and chem- 
ical properties. In one state they may be torpid and 
passive, and in the other active. Thus, there is as 
great an amount of physical difference between car- 
bon as it exists in the diamond and as it exists in 
pure lampblack as between copper and silver, or 
silver and gold. The diamond is the passive form 
of carbon, and can hardly be made to burn in oxygen 
gas, while lampblack, one of the active forms of the 
same element, is so highly combustible as often 'o 


Conclusion. 


281 


take fire spontaneously in the open air. Phosphorus 
also, may be white, poisonous, odorous, luminous, 
soluble, crystalline, soft, and flexible; or in another 
state, without chemical change, but by another mode 
of aggregation of particles, as it is supposed, may 
be red, innocuous, odorless, Aluminous, insoluble, 
amorphous, hard, and brittle. It has been suggested 
that these conditions of the elements are retained 
when they enter into combination. The term isomeric 
compcmids is used in chemistry to represent such as 
contain the same elements, in the same proportions, 
and yet have different properties. Thus, spirits of 
turpentine and the oils of lemon, of juniper, of black 
pepper, and of bergamot, contain equal amounts of 
carbon and hydrogen, yet their properties are very 
different. Oil of roses and illuminating gas are also 
identical in composition. The difference in isomeric 
bodies is theoretically accounted for by supposing 
that the atoms are differently arranged.* 

Thus science enlarges the number of illustrations 
which confirm the doctrines of Holy Writ, and re- 
moves the clouds of ignorance which obscure our 
vision of the Creator’s resources. Thus the volume 
of Nature and the volume of Inspiration mutually 
confirm each other, and the changes indicated by the 
prophecies of the future are shown by science to be 
in accordance with the economy already established 
by Divine Providence. Faith in the record of super- 
natural truth is seen to be similar in essential principle 


* See Youmans’s Class-Book of Chemistry. 


282 


Conclusion. 


with the confidence we repose in the order and 
stability of nature. The natural and the supernatural 
are the complements of each other, and are permeated 
by the same Divine energies, under the guidance of 
the Supreme Wisdom of the same Infinite Will. 


GLOSSARY 


OF 

SCIENTIFIC AND THEOLOGICAL TERMS. 


Abnormal (Lat t ab , “from,” and norma, a “rule”). — Anything 
without or contrary to system or rule. 

Afferent (Lat. ad, “ to,” and fero, to “bear”). — Bearing or pour- 
ing into; as the absorbent vessels which pass into a lymphatic gland. 
Applied to nerves which convey sensation or influence towards the 
nerve-centres. 

Affinity (Lat. affinis, “related”). — In chemistry, the attractive 
force by which dissimilar substances unite to form chemical com- 
pounds. (See Element.) In natural history, a relation of animals 
to each other because of similarity of organization. 

Allotropism (Gr. d/Uof (alios), “other,” and t(> 07 t 6 c ( tropos ), 
“ direction” or “ way”). — In chemistry, the property of existing in 
different conditions. Thus, carbon occurs hard and crystallized in 
octahedrons in the diamond, soft and in hexagonal forms in black- 
lead, and in a third form in lampblack and charcoal. 

Alluvium (Lat. luere, to “wash,” and ad, “together”). — Soil or 
land brought together by the ordinary operation of water, as river- 
plains, low ground once the site of lakes, estuaries, etc. 

Analogy (Gr. ava (ana), “ with,” and Aoyof (logos), “ reasoning”). 
—In geometry it signifies proportion; in zoology, the relation which 
.animals bear to one another, but not in the essential points of organi- 
zation, as in affinity. Analogy is often used to express mere similarity; 
but its specific meaning is similarity of relations. Thus, analogical 
reasoning is reasoning from some similitude which things known bear 
to things unknown. 


(283) 


284 


Glossary. 


Anemone (Gr. uvepog ( anetnos ), “wind”). — The wind-flower; a 
genus of plants of the order Ranunculaceae. Applied also to the 
sea-anemone, or actinia, a species of polyp often seen in rock-holes 
on the sea-coast, which, from its resemblance to a flower, was called 
animal-flower. 

Animalcule (Lat. animalcultim , a “ little animal”). — An animal 
which can be seen only with a microscope. 

Annihilation (Lat. ad, “to,” and nihilum , “nothing”). — The 
act of reducing to nothing, or non-existence. 

Antediluvian (Lat. ante, “before,” and diluvium , “ flood”). — 
Before the time of the Deluge. 

Aphasia (Gr. u<f>aola ( aphasia ), “dumbness from perplexity or 
terror”). — A diseased condition of the brain, manifested by a suspen- 
sion of the faculty of communicating ideas. 

A Priori and A Posteriori. — Two general methods of reasoning 
according to what is called the synthetic and analytic method. The 
first lays down some previous or self-evident principles, and descends 
to their consequences; the other begins with phenomena, and en- 
deavors to ascend to the knowledge of the cause. 

Archaeology (Gr. upxcuog [archaios), “ancient”). — The science 
of antiquities. 

Arminians. — Those who hold with respect to predestination the 
tenets of Arminius, a Protestant divine born in Holland A.D. 1560. 
He taught, in opposition to the Calvinists, or followers of Calvin, that 
no part of the human race were decreed to be lost, or passed by 
without chance of salvation, but that God has determined to save all 
whom He foresaw would persevere in the faith. They are sometimes 
called Remonstrants, from their petition, in 1610, to the States of 
Holland for protection against the persecutions of their opponents. 
At the Synod of Dort, A.D. 1618, nine years after the death of Ar- 
minius, their opinions were defended by Episcopius, professor of 
divinity at Leyden, but they were condemned, and their adherents 
treated with great severity. Among modern churches, the Methodists 
represent the views of Arminians, and Presbyterians those of Calvinists, 
so far as the doctrine of predestination is concerned. 

Atheism (Gr. a {a), “ without,” and ©edf (theos), « God”).— The 
denial of the existence of a God or a Providence. The name Atheist 
was first applied to Diagoras, one of the followers of Democritus, 
who explained all things by the movement of material atoms. The 


Glossary . 285 

other form of ancient atheism was that of Thales, who accounted 
for all things by the different transformations of w ater. 

Plato well says in his Laws that atheism is a disease of the soul 
before it becomes an error of the understanding. 

Assimilation (Lat. assimilo , “ I liken to”). — The act by which 
organized bodies incorporate foreign matter and convert it into their 
own proper substance. It is a very complicate function, and has 
given rise to some of the most difficult problems of physiological 
chemistry. 

Atomic Theory. — In chemistry, the theory of atomic equivalents, 
or proportionate weights of the elements, according to which all 
substances combine. This theory of combining proportions, with the 
expression of the elements by symbols, has rendered the science of 
chemistry quite exact. 

Atonement. — Not merely the act or condition of being at one , — 
i.e. agreement or reconciliation, — but also applied to the act of expia* 
tion, satisfaction, or reparation made by giving an equivalent for an 
injury. In theology it is applied to the expiation of sin made by the 
death of Christ, of which the sacrifices of Jewish and patriarchal 
antiquity were types. 

Automatic (Gr. avrog (autos), “self,” and fiau (mao),“ motion”). — 
Self-moving. Not voluntary. 

Avatar. — In Hindoo mythology, an incarnation of the deity. The 
Hindoos teach that innumerable incarnations have taken place; but 
nine of them are particularly noted, and the Kalki, or tenth avatar, 
is yet to come at the end of the iron age. 

Averroes. — A renowned Arabian philosopher, born in Spain in 
the latter part of the twelfth century. He regarded Aristotle as the 
greatest of all philosophers, and devoted himself to the revival of his 
views. 

Axiom (Gr. agioy ( axioo ), “I demand”). — A universal proposition 
which compels our faith, — the understanding perceiving it to be true 
as soon as it perceives the meaning of the words, although it cannot 
be proved, because it is impossible to make it plainer. All mathe- 
matics depend on such elemental truths. Indeed, all science depends 
on faith in such axioms, expressed or implied. 

Brahminical. — Pertaining to the Brahmins, the first or highest of 
the four castes of Hindoos, in whose hands the whole learning of 


286 


Glossary. 


India remained for ages, and from whom the Grecian sages obtained 
the elements of their philosophy. 

Buddhism. — The religious system of the greater part of Asia. Its 
chief tenets are tliat sensible objects are transient and delusive mani- 
festations of God, that the human soul is an emanation from Deity, 
which, after death, will again be bound to matter and subjected to 
misery unless, by wisdom acquired through prayer and meditation, it 
becomes absorbed into the essence from which it sprang. 

Calvinists. — The followers of Calvin, one of the Reformers of 
the sixteenth century. He rejected the episcopal form of church 
government in favor of the presbyterial system; but his distinguish- 
ing tenets were the doctrines of unconditional predestination, particu- 
lar redemption, irresistible grace, and the certain perseverance of the 
saints. These doctrines are rarely preached in modern times, or, if 
preached, are rendered more acceptable by an announcement of the 
opposite doctrine of the freedom of the will, but they still find a 
place in the catechisms and confessions of some of the churches. 

Carboniferous (Lat. carbo , “coal,” and fero, “I bear”). — A 
geological term applied to those strata which contain coal, and to the 
period when the coal measures were formed. 

Cell (Lat. cella , a “ cell”). — The elementary form of living matter. 
The simplest form of both animals and vegetables is found to be a 
cell, — a bladder-like form, containing fluid, etc. Even the hardest 
tissues, as wood, and bone, and teeth, are shown by physiology to 
have originated from cells, and to consist of a congeries of altered 
cells. 

Cerebellum (Lat. cerebellum , “ little brain”). — The hinder and 
lower part of the brain. 

Cerebro Spinal Axis. — A n anatomical term applied to the brain, 
spinal cord, and nerves which proceed therefrom. 

Cerebrum (Lat. cerebrum, the “brain”). — The front and larger 
mass of the brain. 

Chronology (Gr. xpw’og ( chronos ), “time,” and TJhyoq {logos), 
“ discourse” or “ doctrine”). — The science which treats of the various 
divisions of time, and of the order and succession of events. The 
diversities of epochs among different nations, and the various stand- 
ards for the measurement of intervals, render this one of the most 
uncertain of sciences. Desvignoles mentions that he had collected 


Glossary. 


287 


upwards of two hundred different calculations, the shortest of which 
reckons only 3483 years between the creation and commencement of 
the common era, and the longest 6984; the difference being no less 
than thirty-five centuries. Objections to the Scriptures from so unre- 
liable a source necessarily fail to apply. 

Chrysalis (Gr .xpvaog ( chrysos ), “gold”). — The second condition 
or state through which some insects pass before arriving at their 
winged or perfect state. 

Clairvoyance (Fr., “ clear-sightedness”). — A power attributed to 
persons in a mesmeric state of discerning objects which are not 
present to the senses. 

Clonic Spasm. — An alternate contraction and relaxation of the 
muscles. 

CceNjESTHESIS (Gr. koivoq [koinos), “common,” and aloOeoig ( ais - 
thesis), “feeling”). — Common sensation. By the coensesthesis, states 
of our bodies are revealed to us which have their seat in the sphere 
of vegetative life. 

Consensual (Lat. con, “with,” and sentio , to “think,” “feel,” or 
‘‘perceive”). — Excited or caused by sensation, and not volitional. 

Co-ordinated. — Brought into common action. 

Correlation of Force. — Corresponding similarity or parallelism. 
A term given to the modern theory that all the forces of nature are 
but modifications of a single force. 

Cosmogony (Gr. noofiog ( kosmos ), “ world,” and yovda ( goneict ), 
“generation”). — The science, or rather theory, of the origin of the 
universe, sometimes called Cosmology. 

Creed (Lat. credo, “ I believe”). — A summary of faith or of prin- 
ciples. In the Greek Church such a summary was termed a symbol, 
and this name is retained among Lutherans. Among numerous 
creeds, those most celebrated are the Apostles’ Creed (so called), the 
Nicene, and the Athanasian. The necessity of such summaries arose 
out of the discussion of items of faith in the early Christian centuries. 
They were intended as testimonies against erroneous doctrines. 

Darwinian Theory. — A modification of the theory of the develop- 
ment of all living things from a single form, or from a few forms. It 
is sometimes called the “theory of natural selection.” Agassiz, Bal- 
four, Brewster, and other eminent scientists have shown that this 
theory is contradicted by modern science; yet certain sciolists cling 


288 Glossary. 

to it as if it possessed a charm for the human understanding. (See 
Chapter VI.) 

Deduction. — Inference drawn from premises laid down. It is the 
opposite of induction, which consists in rising from particular truths 
to the determination of a general principle. The principle of dedtic- 
tion is, that things which agree with the same thing agree with one 
another. The principle of induction is, that in the same circumstances, 
and in the same substances, from the same causes the same effects 
will follow. The mathematical and metaphysical sciences are 
founded on deduction; the physical sciences rest on induction . 

Deism. — The creed of a deist. It acknowledges the existence of 
one God, but denies revelation. 

Demon (Lat. dcemon). — In the pagan mythology, a spirit holding a 
middle place between men and the celestial deities. In modern use 
the word is applied generally to an evil spirit. 

Development Theory. See Darwinian Theory. 

Diluvian (Lat. dis, “asunder,” and luere , to “wash”). — The 
result of the extraordinary action of water. Deposits of loam, gravel, 
etc., which are supposed to have been caused by the Deluge, or ancient 
currents of water of extraordinary violence. 

Divination. — The art of foretelling future events by the aid o l 
superior beings, or by other than human means. The ancient heathens 
divided divination into two kinds, natural and artificial. The first 
was a sort of afflatus or supposed inspiration, the other by means of 
certain rites and ceremonies and omens. 

DocETiE (Gr. doKeiv ( dokein ), to “seem”). — One of the earliest 
heretical sects, which taught that Christ lived and acted in appear- 
ance only, and not in reality. Some divines have considered that the 
express declarations of the nature of Christ in St. John’s writings 
were especially directed against these errors. 

Dualism — The Manichean system, which taught the existence of 
two gods,— a good and an evil one. Also, the system of Anaxagoras 
and Plato, who taught two principles in nature, an active and a passive 
one. 

Ecstasy (Gr. luaTaoig (, ekstasis )). — A state of trance. In medicine, 
a species of catalepsy in which the patient remembers, after the fit, 
the ideas he had during its continuance. 

Efferent (Lat. effero, to “bear out”). — Conveying outwards. 


Glossary . 


289 


Element. — A simple or uncompounded substance; the last result 
of analysis. Thus, iron is considered an element, while iron rust is 
an oxide of iron, because it is a compound of iron and oxygen. 
Chemistry has isolated about sixty elements, from whose combinations 
all material things are composed. 

Empirical. — Pertaining to experiment or experience. From the 
common custom of quacks to boast of their experience, it has come 
to signify what pertains to quackery. 

Enteric (Gr. evrepov (enteron), “ intestine”). — Intestinal; as, en- 
teric fever. 

Eozoon. — The name given to a remarkable fossil, the remains of 
an animal of the order Foraminifera, but of much greater size than 
existing species. It was discovered in the Laurentian strata of Canada, 
below the Silurian formation. Its discovery in strata regarded as 
azoic, or primitive, has attracted considerable attention among geolo- 
gists, and may revolutionize present systems. 

Epicurean. — Pertaining to the tenets of Epicurus (b.c. 300). From 
a probably mistaken view of his teachings, the word has come tc 
represent those who make pleasure the chief end of life and standard 
of virtue. 

Evidences. — A term applied to the proofs of the Divine authority 
of the Scriptures. External evidences are miracles and prophecy; 
internal evidences are drawn from the nature of the revelation; and 
collateral evidences relate to other circumstances. 

Experimentum Crucis. — A crucial or decisive experiment. 

Familiar Spirits.- — Good or evil spirits (demons), which were 
supposed to be continually within call, and at the service of their 
masters. In the history of witchcraft in modern Europe the idea of 
familiar was restricted to evil spirits. (See Demon.) 

Firmament. — An expanse; a wide extent (referring to the sky). 
Such is the significance of the Hebrew word which is thus translated. 
In the language of the old astronomers, it is the orb of the fixed 
stars, the outermost of the celestial spheres. 

Fossil (Lat . fossus, “dug up”). — A term applied to organic re- 
mains, generally petrified, which are dug out of the earth’s strata. 

Free- Agency. — The state of acting freely or without necessity. 
Synonymous with free will. Coleridge well says, “The will is 
ultimately self-determined, or it is no longer a will under the law of 
25 


290 


Glossary. 


perfect freedom, but a nature under the mechanism of cause and 
effect.” In the question of the spontaneity of mental power — the 
freedom of the will — is involved the whole discussion of religion and 
infidelity. If Nature be all (in the sense of infidelity), man’s will is 
compelled, not free. 

Function (Lat . f audio, from fungor , to “perform”). — In natural 
history, the proper action, office, or act of any part or organ, or 
system of organs. Thus, we speak of the vegetative functions of 
nutrition (including selection and assimilation), secretion, and repro- 
duction; and of the animal functions of sensation and volition. 

Ganglion*— Ganglionic System (Gr. ya.-yyfa.bv {ganglion ), a 
'‘knot”). — An enlargement in the course of a nerve. The ganglionic 
system, or great sympathetic nerve, is a term applied to the ganglia and 
nerves of common sensation. 

Geology (Gr. yij {ge), the “earth,” and fa>yo<; {logos), “doctrine”). 
— The science which treats of the structure of the globe and the 
causes of its physical features. 

Gnostics (Gr. yvtiatx; {gnosis), “knowledge”). — A sect of philoso- 
phers in the first ages of Christianity, who pretended that they only 
had a true knowledge of the Christian religion. The grand principle 
of the system seems to have been an attempt to reconcile the difficulties 
arising from the existence of evil/in the world. They formed a the- 
ology after the philosophy of Pythagoras and Plato, to which they 
accommodated all their interpretations of Scripture. They held that 
all things were derived from successive emanations from the fountain 
of Deity. These emanations they called ceons. 

Gravity (Lat. gravis, “heavy”). — The mutual tendency of all 
bodies to approach each other with forces which are directly as their 
masses and inversely proportional to the squares of their distances. 

Harmony of the Gospels. — A title given to works proposing to 
reduce the events of gospel history to order of time. 

Hegelianism. — A form of German philosophy, named after Hegel. 
It is one of the forms of pantheism. Brahminism viewed God as 
Being, Leibnitz as Monad, Pythagoras as Number, Spinoza as Sub- 
stance, and Hegel as the Notion of which everything existing is a 
form. With Hegel, mankind’s knowledge of God is God’s knowledge 
of himself; in the mind of mankind God evolves himself. 


Glossary . 291 

Hibernation (Lat. hybernus , “wintry”). — A condition of torpor 
in which some animals remain during the winter season. 

Hieroglyphics (Gr. lepog ( hieros ), “sacred,” and y?d<pu (gIypho'). t 
“ I engrave”). — Picture-writing. Applied chiefly to the inscriptions 
on the Egyptian monuments. Champollion discovered that there 
were three kinds of characters used: i. Pictures of the objects, ir. 
whole or in part; 2. Symbols; 3. Phonetic characters, referring to 
the initial letter of the name of the animal or thing represented.’ 

Hypochondriac (Gr. in 6 ( hypo ),“ under,” and ( chondros ), 

“cartilage”). — A combination of dyspepsia and melancholy. 

Hypothesis (Gr. inoOeovg {hypothesis), a “ supposition”). — A theory 
or supposition for the purpose of explaining what is not understood. 
It is to be regretted that so much passes for science which is merely 
hypothesis. 

Idealism. — The theory which makes everything to consist in ideas, 
and denies the existence of material bodies. 

Identity (Lat. idem, the “same”). — Sameness, as distinguished 
from resemblance and diversity. Personal identity is synonymous 
with personality. Consciousness merely ascertains personal identity, 
but does not constitute it. 

Induction. See Deduction. 

Infusoria. — Microscopic animals inhabiting stagnant water and 
various infusions. 

Innate (Lat. in, “in,” and nasco, to “be born”). — Inborn. 

Inspiration. — In a theological sense, the supernatural influence of 
the Spirit of God by which the sacred writers were qualified to com- 
municate Divine truth without error; or such suggestions or impres- 
sions on the mind as leave no room to doubt the reality of their 
Divine origin. 

Isomerism (Gr. loog (Aw), “equal,” and fiipoc (meros),“ part”). — 
Identity of elements and proportions, with diversity of properties. 

Latitudinarian. — Loose in principles or views. Free-thinking. 
An undue latitude of interpretation. 

Laurentian. — A term given to the primitive rocks in Canada, 
which form the backbone, as it were, of that part of the continent. 

Law (from the Anglo-Saxon lecgan, to “lay down”) — A mode or 
rule. A law supposes an agent and a power; for it is the mode 


292 


Glossary. 


according to which the agent proceeds, the order according to which 
the power acts. Physical laws are truly called in Scripture ordinances 
of heaven. 

Legend. — A fabulous or unauthenticated story purporting to come 
down from antiquity. 

Magic (Lat. ars magica , the “art of the Magi,” these Persian 
philosophers being regarded by the Remans as the chief possessors 
of supernatural powers). — Magic was called white or celestial magic, 
when it claimed to originate from good spirits ; black or diabolical 
magic, or witchcraft, when based on a compact with the devil, or on 
superstitious rites borrowed from heathenism ; and natural magic, from 
the propensity of the scientific in a past age to take advantage of 
the credulity of the ignorant. 

Mammals (Lat. mamma , a “teat”). — The highest and most com- 
pletely organized class of animals. Man is placed in this class, as 
well as the horse, dog, bear, whale, etc. It embraces those which 
suckle their young. 

Marasmus (Gr. /uapcuvio ( maraino), “ I waste away”). — Emaciation, 
wasting. 

Materialism. — The metaphysical theory which teaches that all 
existence may he resolved into some modification of matter. This 
theory assumes many shapes. At one time we meet it in one of the 
forms of pantheism, which teaches the self-evolution of the physical 
universe. At another time it assumes the form of the mechanico- 
corpuscular theory. Again it teaches that the brain secretes thought, 
as the liver does bile. Democritus and Epicurus among the ancients, 
Gassendi, Hobbes, and Priestley among the moderns, were noted 
materialists. 

Mediator.— A term applied to Jesus Christ, as interceding between 
God and man and obtaining for the latter the remission of the pun- 
ishment due to sin. Those who deny the essential Divinity of Christ 
reject also the idea of his mediatorial character. 

Mediums. — A term applied to those who, according to the teach- 
ing of modern spiritualism, are possessed by the influence of disem- 
bodied spirits, and speak or write under such influence. 

Medulla Oblongata.— A part of the brain formed by the junction 
of the crura of the brain and cerebellum. It terminates in the spinal 
marrow. 


Glossary. 


293 


Mesmeric Trance. — A sort of cataleptic condition into whict 
persons of impressible imagination may be thrown by animal magnet- 
ism, or mesmerism, as it is called. Like natural catalepsy, or, rather, 
the disease so named, it is often associated with a sort of clairvoyance, 
the nature of which has led to much speculation, but is not yet 
understood. 

Metamorphosis (Gr. fiera (mcla), “ change,” and fiopQfj ( viorphe ), 
“form”). — Transformation. In entomology it refers to the change 
of form in insects, as the change of a caterpillar from larva to pup a 
and to imago . 

Metaphysics (Gr. //era {meta), “after,” and <j>vm<; (physis), “na- 
ture”). — All those studies and inquiries which are conversant with 
other objects than those which are physical and sensible. Metaphysics 
was formerly divided into general and special. The former was called 
ontology , or the science of being in general. Special metaphysics was 
sometimes called p7ieumatology , and, as it related to three objects,— 
God, the world, and the human mind, — was subdivided into — 1. 
Natural theology, or theodicy; 2. Rational cosmology; 3. Rational 
psychology. 

Metempsychosis (Gr. uera [met a), “change,” and {psyche), 
“soul”). — The doctrine of the migration of the soul through different 
successive bodies. It was believed among the Egyptians, and was a 
leading doctrine of the Pythagorean philosophy. It is almost univer- 
sal among the Hindoos, and is the foundation of the Brahminical 
injunction of abstinence from flesh. 

Molecule (Lat. tnolecula , a “little mass”). — The smallest portion 
of matter cognizable by any of our senses. 

Monad (Gr. / iovug ( monas ), “unity,” “one”). — An ultimate atom, 
or simple unextended point. 

Mysticism. — A word of very vague signification, applied generally 
to all those religious views or tendencies which aspire to a direct 
communication between man’s soul and God. It is sometimes applied 
to the pantheism which teaches that God is, and is revealed, in out- 
ward things; to the Quietism of Madame Guyon, F6nelon, etc , who 
looked for direct revelations in a species of ecstasy; to the doctrines 
of the Illuminati in Germany; to the visions of Swedenborg, etc. 
There is no doubt a scriptural mysticism, but the Bible exhorts us not 
to believe every spirit, but to “ try the spirits whether they be of 
God.” 

25 * 


294 


Glossary. 


Nascent (Lat. nascens , to “be born”)*— Beginning to exist or to 
grow. In the act of being produced or evolved (as a gas, in chemistry). 
From present indications in microscopic science, the time is not far 
distant when physiology will be able to distinguish between nascent 
or germinal growing tissue and that which has accomplished its vital 
function. 

Neo-Platonists. — A sect of mystical philosophers who flourished 
in the fourth and fifth centuries of the Christian era. They mixed 
some tenets of ancient Platonism with others derived from various 
sources, and particularly from the demonology of the East. 

Neptunian Theory. — The geological hypothesis which refers the 
formation of rocks to an aqueous origin. 

Nomadic (Gr. vo/iaAtKog ( nomadikos ), “pastoral”). — Applied to 
tribes of men without fixed habitation, generally pastoral tribes. 

Ontological. — Pertaining to the science of ontology, or the 
science of being in general, and its attributes. 

Oracle (Lat. oraculum , from oro, to “utter”). — The name given 
primarily to the response given by the pagan divinities to those who 
consulted them, but afterwards applied to the place as well as to the 
divinities from whom the responses were supposed to proceed. It is 
used in the Bible to represent the sanctuary, or most holy place, in 
the temple; and in the plural — oracles of God — to express the reve- 
lations of God in the Scriptures. 

Organic — Organization (Gr. opyavov ( organon) y a “member” or 
“instrument”).— Pertaining to, or the act of forming, bodies with 
organs: usually appropriated to vitalized matter, as the tissues of 
animals and vegetables. 

Osiris. — The name of one of the chief Egyptian divinities, the 
brother and husband of Isis. After having effected a reformation in 
Egypt, it is said he visited and enlightened the greater part of Europe 
and Asia, and on his return he was assassinated by his brother Typhon 
(the evil principle). He, however, “rose again to a new life,” and 
became the “judge of mankind in a future state.” 

Pantheism (Gr. tzolv [pan) y “all,” and deoc (, iheos ), “God”).— 
The theory which identifies nature — the universe in its totality — with 
God. The modern German pantheism regards the universe as the 


Glossary. 295 

self-development of God. Another view is expressed by Pope in hu 
Essay on Man, in the lines, — - 

“ All are but parts .of one stupendous whole. 

Whose body Nature is, and God the soul.” / 

Many have considered this as similar to the Christian view of God 
as expressed by St. Paul, — “ In whom we live, and move, and have 
our being.” The difference is that in the Scriptures God’s independ- 
ent subsistence is regarded as the condition and ground of all phe- 
nomenal existence, and of reason itself. God may exist without the 
world, but the world is inconceivable without God. 

Paralysis (Gr. napakveiv (paraluein), to “weaken”). — Palsy. 

Pentateuch (Gr. nevre ( pente ) “ five,” and ( teuchos ), an “ in- 

strument”). — The five books of Moses, viz., Genesis, Exodus, Leviti- 
cus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. 

Phcenix. — In mythology, a celebrated bird, which was said to live 
five or six hundred years in the wilderness, where she built a funeral 
pile of aromatic wood and gums, which she lighted by fanning with 
her wings. She was only apparently consumed, however, this beirg 
the process by which she renewed her vitality. Hence the Phoenix 
became an emblem of immortality, and was frequently brought for- 
ward by the Fathers of the church as an illustration of the resurrec- 
tion. 

Phrenic. — Relating to the diaphragm. 

Physical Science, or Physics. — The science of the material sys- 
tem, including natural history, natural philosophy, and chemistry. 
Physics and metaphysics include the knowledge of whatever exists. 

Physico-Theology. — Theology illustrated from nature. 

Physiology (Gr. <j>vmg [physis), “nature,” and "koyog [logos), a 
“discourse”). — The science of vital phenomena, or of the functions 
of living beings. 

Platonism. — The philosophy of Plato. It is difficult to give an 
idea of this philosophy in a few words, as it went deeper down to the 
foundations of science than that of any of his predecessors, and 
tinged the opinions of many who succeeded him. In this system 
knowledge is not to be confounded with the impressions on the senses, 
or with the judgments founded upon them. Radically, knowledge 
consists in archetypal ideas, which are themselves included in the 
highest unity, or God, from whom they derive their reality. Theology 


296 


Glossary. 


is, therefore, the ultimate science in which all the other sciences con* 
verge: dialectics, as the science of the true; ethics, as the science 
of the morally beautiful; and physics, as that which discerns the 
order and fitness of outward things. Iii this account we have followed 
those who give the most favorable view of Platonism. ( See 
Chapter V.) 

Plutonic. — A geological term applied to unstratified crystalline 
rocks, supposed to be formed at great depths by igneous fusion. 

Pneumothorax (Gr. izvtvfia (pneuma).“ air,” and ( thorax ), 

the “chest”). — An accumulation of air in the sac of the pleura. 

Polyps (Gr. nolivg (polus), “many,” and novc {pous), a “foot”). — 
A group of x-adiated animals, having a fleshy body, of a conical or 
cylindrical form, commonly fixed by one extremity, and with the 
mouth at the opposite end generally surrounded with tentacles. There 
are many families of polyps, including the sea-anemones, madrepores, 
coral -polyps, etc. 

Polytheism (Gr. 7r okvg ( polus ), “ many,” and deog ( theos ), “ God”). 
— The doctrine of a plurality of Gods. Sabianism (or planet-worship), 
Zendism (or fire-worship), demon-worship, hero-worship, and animal- 
worship, together with the fetichism of some negro tribes, may all be 
considered as varieties of polytheism. 

Positivism. — The philosophy of M. Auguste Comte. “The lead- 
ing conception of M. Comte is, — There are but three phases of intel- 
lectual evolution, — the theological (supernatural), the metaphysical , 
and {he positive. In the supernatural phase, the mind seeks causes ; 
unusual phenomena are interpreted as the signs of the pleasure or 
displeasure of some god. In the metaphysical phase, the supernatural 
agents are set aside for abstract forces inherent in substances. In the 
positive phase, the mind restricts itself to the discovery of the laws 
of phenomena.” 

Primitive Religion.— The religion of Adam and the patriarchs. 
For an account of the early religious faith, see Chapter III. 

Propitiation. — The act of making propitious. The atonement 
or atoning sacrifice which removes the obstacle to man’s salvation. 
Christ is the propitiation for the sins of men. (I. John, ii.) 

Proserpine. — The Latin form of Persephone, the name of a 
Grecian goddess, sprung from Jupiter and Ceres. She was stolen by 
Pluto, and carried to the infernal regions, where she became his 
queen. The wanderings of Ceres in search of her daughter were 


Glossary. 297 

finally rewarded by Proserpine being allowed to spend two-thirds of 
the year with her parents, the rest being spent with Pluto. 

Psychology (Gr. rpvxy ( psyche ), the “soul,” and TJbyoq {logos) 
“ discourse”). — In its largest meaning it is synonymous with mental 
philosophy. 

Pyrrhonism. — The tenets of Pyrrho (b.c. 300). These are said 
to have been so absurdly skeptical that the Pyrrhonists would not put 
even as much confidence in the senses as was necessary to preserva- 
tion. 

• 

Rationalism. — A system of interpretation common during the last 
century among German divines, and from them extending through 
Europe and America, which attributes a merely human character to 
Christianity, and reduces the Bible accounts to a mixture of truth and 
error natural to fallible men. Its adherents have no settled or con- 
sistent opinions among themselves, but unite only in opposing the 
supernatural character of religion. 

Reflex Motion. — A term applied in physiology to certain in- 
voluntary movements of the body, excited by influence conveyed to 
the nerve-centres by afferent, and thence to the muscles by efferent, 
nerves. 

Reformation. — An important era in political and ecclesiastical 
history, when the authority of the papacy and the peculiar doctrines 
of the Romish church were successfully called in question. It is 
commonly dated from the year 15 17, when Luther began to oppose 
the pope and condemned the sale of indulgences. 

Remonstrants. See Arminians. 

Sanctification. — In theology, the purification of the moral nature 
by the special operation of the Holy Spirit, which ensues upon Justifi- 
cation, which latter word represents the being accounted just, or 
pardoned of sin, by reason of faith in the atonement of Christ. 

Saurians (Gr. oaiy/of ( sauros ), a “ lizard”). — Reptiles covered 
with scales and having four legs, as the crocodile and lizard. The 
most gigantic species are found in a fossil state. 

Scholasticism. — The scholastic philosophy, — an endeavor to base 
the doctrines of the church upon the Aristotelian philosophy. It was 
common to the schools and universities during what are called the 
flark ages : hence its name. 


298 


Glossary. 


Secretion. — The process by which substances are separated from 
the blood in animals, or from the sap in vegetables, as milk, bile, etc. 
in the former, and gum, resin, etc. in the latter. 

Sedimentary. — In geology, applied to earth, sand, etc., which 
originated in the sediment of ancient waters. 

Sensational. — In mental philosophy, the theory which resolves 
all intellectual operations into modifications of sensations. It is 
sometimes called Sensualism. 

Shakers. — A sect of seceders from the body of Quakers. They 
live in communities, as at New Lebanon, N.Y. Their name arises 
from their manner of worship. 

Silurian. — In geology, fossiliferous strata below the beds of the 
old red sandstone. Called after the Silures, or ancient inhabitants of 
Wales. 

Skepticism. — A word first applied to the followers of Pyrrho, who 
reasoned themselves into universal doubt. In modern times Mr. 
Ilume represents this school of metaphysicians. The word is now 
applied to the expression of doubt or unbelief respecting the Divine 
inspiration of the Scriptures. 

Socinians. — The followers of Socinus. They . assert the mere 
humanity of Christ, and thus differ from Arians, who attribute to Ilim 
a superhuman nature. 

Somatic (Gr. aw/^a (soma), a “body”). — Pertaining to the body. 

Sophists (Gr. oo<p6(; (sop/tos), “ wise”).— From Greek customs it 
has become applied to all who cultivate science or philosophy for 
personal advantage, without regard to the truth of what they advance. 
It was chiefly applied to a class of teachers in the fifth century b,c., 
who were opposed by Socrates, Plato, etc. 

Sorcerer (Lat. sortitor, from sors, a “lot”). — Properly, divination 
by lot, but ordinarily used to signify one pretending to magical 
powers. 

Spectrum Analysis. — The discrimination of the chemical con- 
stitution of luminous or burning bodies by means of certain lines 
in the spectrum. The application of this mode of analysis to the 
heavenly bodies, proving thereby their chemical structure, is among 
the most wonderful of scientific attainments. 

Spiritualism. — In metaphysics, as distinguished from materialism, 
is the system which teaches that all that is real is spirit, soul, or self; 
the external world being considered only as impressions on the mind 


Glossary. 299 

The term is also applied to those who believe in intercourse with 
disembodied spirits by means of writing, speaking, or rapping me- 
diums. The conventions of such have been chiefly noted for antag- 
onism to the Scriptures. 

Swedenborgians. — The followers of Emanuel Swedenborg, the 
most celebrated mystic of the eighteenth century. The principal 
doctrines of this system are, that there is one God, the Lord Jesus 
Christ, in whom is a Trinity, not of persons, but analogous to that 
which exists in man, — soul, form, and operation; that the resurrection 
is not of the natural body, but of the spiritual body from the natural; 
that natural things correspond to spiritual and represent them, so that 
the Bible contains a spiritual sense in every word and letter of the 
literal sense, and must be interpreted by what is called the doctrine 
of correspondences; and that the New Jerusalem foretold in the 
Apocalypse is the new church of those who hold these doctrines. 

Symbol (Gr. cvv {sun), “together,” and (3uXkeLv ( ballein ), to 
“throw”). — A term applied to the creeds by the old ecclesiastical 
writers: hence symbolical books are such as contain the creeds and 
confessions of different churches. The word is also applied to the 
representation of any moral thing by the images or properties of na- 
tural things. Thus, the lion is the symbol of courage, the lamb of 
meekness, etc. 

Sympathetic Nerve. — Sometimes called the ganglionic , the 
vegetative , or the organic nervous system. That portion of the nervous 
system which is diffused through the abdomen, forming many nets and 
plexuses, and which harmonizes all the vegetative functions. 

Talmud. — The traditionary laws of the Jews. It consists of two 
parts, — the Gemara and the Mishna. The Gemara consists of com- 
ments on the Mishna, or Rabbinical traditions. 

Theology (Gr. deos {theos), “ God,” and Aoyoj- {logos), “doctrine”). 
— The science which treats of the nature and attributes of God, of 
his relations to man, and of the manner in which they may be dis- 
covered. 

Transcendental. — A word used in the Kantian philosophy to 
express that which transcends or goes beyond the limits of actual 
experience. 

Travertine. — A species of limestone, deposited from water hold- 
ing carbonate of lime in solution. 

© 


300 


Glossary. 


Unity of Force. See Correlation. 

Universal Ether. —Attenuated matter which is supposed by 
natural philosophers to fill all space. 

Vedas. — The sacred books of the Hindoos. 

Versions. — Translations of the Scriptures. The earliest were the 
Samaritan Pentateuch and the Greek Septuagint. In the earliest 
periods of the Christian era, we meet with the Oriental versions , viz., 
the Syriac Old and New Testaments, in the first century; the Coptic, 
and the Ethiopic; the Latin or Western versions, the Italic, the Vul- 
gate, and the Gothic; and the Greek versions of Aquila, Theodotion, 
and Symmachus. 

Vicarious. — Substituted. Applied to the sufferings of Christ as 
substituted for the punishment of man’s guilt. 

Witchcraft. — Pretended divination by supernatural agency. 

Zendavf.sta. — The sacred books of the Parsees in India, and 
Guebers or fire-worshipers in Persia. 

Zoophyte (Gr. fwov (zoon), an “ animal,” and <pvrov ( phyton ), a 
“plant”). — An animal-flower. (See Polyp and Anemone.) 


INDEX 


Abstract being of Hegelianism, 22. 
Accordance of the Bible and geol- 
ogy, 165, 167. 

Action of sympathetic nerve, 197. 
Adaptation of the Scriptures, 114. 
Affections of living beings, 196. 
Agassiz on development, 158. 
Allotropism, 280. 

Analogies of future bodies, 280. 
Analogy of faith, 113. 

Anaxagoras, 35. 

Anaximander, 35, 122. 

Ancient ideas of the world, 149. 
Angelic ministries, 96. 

mode of, 96. 

Angel-Jehovah, the, 95. 

Angels, influence of, 251. 

Animal magnetism, 212. 

Anima mundi, 122. 

Annihilation, no necessity for, 193. 
Anselm’s argument on atonement, 
222. 

Antiochus, persecutions of, 36. 
Antiquity of the Bible, 33. 

Aphasia, 207. 

Apostles’ Creed, 266. 

Appearance of the earth’s crust, 
164. 

Astronomy consistent with the 
Bible, 143. 

Atheism, 34, 49, 124, 125. 

2(j 


Atonement, parodies of the, 74. 
Averroes, 40. 

Bacon’s philosophy, 46. 

Balfour, Prof., on the identity of 
species, 156. 

Bible the original record of revela- 
tion. 61. 

Biblical ideas, source of, 73. 

history of the creation, 149. 
Brewster, Sir David, against the 
Darwinian hypothesis, 146, 158, 
159 - 

Brotherhood of man, 120. 
Buckland, Dr., on geology and the 
Bible, 156. 

Buddhists, 35. 

Burning bush, 136. 

Bush, Prof., on the resurrection, 
272. 

Butler’s Analogy, 41. 

Catalepsy, 251. 

Cell-life, 182. 

Celsus, 38. 

Cerebro-spinal nerves, 197. 

Chaos from ruined worlds, 165. 
Christ an expiatory sacrifice, 219. 

his sacrifice voluntary, 234. 
Christian conception of God, 94. 
Christianity adapted to man, 39. 

( 3 QI ) 


302 


Index. 


Christianity a development, 54. 
peculiarity of, 217, 
true test of, 39. 

Circle of organic life, 181. 
Common sensation, 197. 

Conditions of regeneration, 245. 
Conflict of Christianity with hea- 
thenism, 37. 

Conscience, or moral sensibility, 
208, 242. 

Consciousness, seat of, 205. 
Contextual interpretation, 112. 
Contradictions, apparent, explain- 
ed, 109. 

apparent, no real objection, 109. 
Convulsions of nature, 164. 
Corporeal sensation, 196. 
Correlation of forces applied to life 
and history, 187. 

Creation, account of, in Job, 150. 

implies freedom, 24. 

Creeds to be judged of by the 
Bible, 1 13. 

Crises of faith, 37. 

Curiosities of Scripture of no spirit- 
ual benefit, no. 

Cuvier on transformation, 15 7. 

Daemon of Socrates, 246. 

Days and generations synonymous, 
166. 

of Genesis indeterminate, 166. 
Death not extinction, 179. 
Definitions of life, 186. 

Degrees of inspiration, 105, 106. 
Deism, 14, 18. 

Deity, a personal, unknown in 
Greece, 113. 

Delphic inscription, origin of, 124. 
Descartes, 40, 48. 

Destruction of the world, 121. 
Development theory, 17, 18. 


Discoveries anticipated by Scrip- 
ture, 105. 

Diversities of interpretation, 114, 
116. 

Divination, 247. 

Divine condescension in the New 
Testament, 141. 

love more glorious than power, 
142. 

truth only from God, 252. 
Docetism, 265. 

Doctrine of the Logos, 95. 
Dreaming, 211, 251. 

Drew, Samuel, on the resurrection, 
273 - 

Early Christian apologists, 38. 
Eclectic school of philosophy, 38. 
Effects of Holy Spirit on the soul f 
245 - 

of passions on the body, 202, 
203. 

Elevation not inspiration, 254. 
Elohim, 131. 

Emerson, 45. 

Emotions, 200. 

seat of, 205. 

English deism, 37, 38. 

Epicurus, 35, 37. 

Errors in science will not invalidate 
Scripture, 107, 108. 

Evidences of Christianity, classifi- 
cation of, 90. 
experimental, 28. 
external and internal, 90. 
various, 27. 

Examination of Romans ii. 17-24, 
82, 83. 

Exceptions to general laws, 162. 
Existence dependent on God, 192. 

of God, 1 19. 

Expression, 205. 


Index . 


303 


Faith defined, 11. 

necessary to science, 12. 
to explain mind, 14. 
Faith-faculty, the, 242. 

Fall of man, 243. 

Fatherhood of God, 120. 

Feeling, 200. 

Folly of mystical correspondences, 
hi. 

Forgiveness and santification thro’ 
Christ, 230. 

Free-agency various, 209, 210. 
French infidelity, 37, 41, 42. 

Future of brutes, 195. 

Geology a science of beginnings, 
167. 

confirmatory of Scripture, 152, 
153. i 6 4. 

discoveries of, 151. 
revolution impending in, 154. 
German rationalism, 37, 40. 
Gnostics, 265, 268. 

God not the universe, 125. 

God’s moral government, what it 
involves, 228. 

Grammatical interpretation of 
Scripture, hi. 

Grecian philosophy, 34. 

Greece, early history of, 70. 
religion of, 71. 

Guyot, Prof., on geology and 
Scripture, 154. 

Harmonies of gospels, 108. 
Harmony, — a theory of life, 183. 
Hierocles, 38. 

Historic interpretation, 112. 
History confirmatory of Scripture, 
57- 58. 80. 

of astronomy confirmatory of 
Scripture, 169. 


History of a vitalized atom, 182. 
of the doctrine of mediation, 
221, 222. 

of the doctrine of resurrection, 
266-270. 

Human element in the Bible, 91. 

remains at Abbeville, 60. 
Humboldt on origin of man, 72. 

on the Scriptures, 160. 
Hypocrisy of rationalism, 44. 
Hypotheses of geology, 153. 

Ideas, 200. 

Identity, theories of, 274. 
Imagination, 207. 

Immutable law a fallacy, 163. 
India, early religious thought of, 71. 
Infidelity unscientific, 33, 45. 
Influence of mind on body, 202. 
Innate ideas not the source of re- 
ligion, 75. 

Insane philosopher, 185. 
Inspiration, extreme views of, 91. 
Inspired men sometimes passive, 
104. 

Instincts, 205. 

Internal evidence, 90. 
Interpretation depends on inspira- 
tion, 90, 97, 98. 

Intoxication, 212. 

Irregularities in nature, 162. 
Isomeric compounds, 281. 

Jehovah, meaning of, 134. 

Jewish reverence for the Scriptures, 
91- 

Judgment, 208. 

Julian, 38. 

Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason, 
79- 80. 


304 


Index. 


Knowledge of Moses divine, 173, 
174 - 

Language necessary to thought, 77. 
Law not necessity, 161. 

variations from, 161. 

Laws of nature, 23-26. 

Life a condition or result, 191. 
before light, 169. 
is matter’s master, 189. 
necessary to physiology as light 
to optics, 190. 
not from organization, 184. 
not material, 18. 
propagation of, 191. 

Lucian, 38. 

Lucretius, 36. 

Lyell on species, 157. 

Magic, belief in, 39, 247. 

views of ancients respecting, 
248. 

Man, creation of, 171, 172. 

not originally barbarous, 53. 
Materialism, 34, 49. 

Materials for study complete, 29. 
Mathematical axioms, 12. 
Mediation not unreasonable, 228. 
Memory, 206. 

Mental science based on physi- 
ology, 196. 

Mesmeric theory of life, 187. 
Metaphysics against pantheism, 18. 
Methodism, 41. 

Microscope, discoveries of the, 144. 
Mind not dependent on brain, 198. 
Minutiae of creation, 144. 
Miracles, Hume’s argument 
against, 172, 

Mode of Christ’s mediation not re- 
vealed, 220. 

of life modifies tradition, 58. 


Mode of revelation, 94. 

Modern rationalism, 44. 

unbelief, 28, 29, 37. 

Molecular death, 191. 

Morality against pantheism, 21, 22. 
Moses the prophet of the past, 
155 - 

Mungo Park, 146. 

Mutual action of mind and body, 
196. 

Mystery no objection, 232. 

Names of Deity, 131, 134, 135. 
Necessity, argument against, 23. 
Necromancy, 253. 

Neo-platonism, 38. 

Nerves, afferent and efferent, 204, 
205. 

Obligations flow from relations, 120. 
Obscure impressions, 201. 
Omnipotence of God, 139. 
Opposition to Christ as Mediator, 
218. 

to Christianity, causes of, 34. 
to Christianity, various, 28, 29, 
46. 

to faith unscientific, 14. 
Oracles, 247. 

Organic germ necessary to life, 181. 
Organization, 18. 

Oriental philosophy, 34. 

Origin of idea of God, 120. 

Paine’s Age of Reason, 42. 
Pantheism, 15, 16,34, 119, 188, 193. 
Parker, Theodore, 45. 

Parts of Scripture originally unin- 
spired, 91, 92, 106. 

Patriarchal ideas of God, 138, 139. 
knowledge, 54, 55. 
religion, 56. 


Index. 


Pentecost, 244. 

Perception, 205. 

Philosophic theories, 34. 
origin of, 34. 

Physical origin of life in text-books, 
188, 189. 

Physiological metaphysics, 204. 
Physiology no refuge for infidelity, 
180. 

Pictorial revelation, 98, 99. 

Picture of creation, 169. 

Plants anterior to sunlight, 170. 
Plato’s Theism, 122, 123. 

Plurality essential in the Divine 
nature, 131. 

Pope’s Essay on Man, 37. 
Porphyry, 38. 

Positivism, 49. 

priestcraft of, 16. 

Precepts of Noah, 56. 

Primeval man, — by the duke of 
Argyll, 61-64. 

Principle of interpretation, 106, 107, 
no, in. 

Provision for spiritual functions, 242. 
Psychological experience not the 
origin of religion, 79. 
Punishment of sin, 228, 229. 
Pyrrhonism, 34, 49. 

Pythagoras, 35. 

Reason repudiates pantheism, 130. 
Reciprocity of body and mind, 196. 
Redemption the freedom and love 
of God, 26. 

Reflex motions, 198. 

Regeneration, 245. 

Relation of science and faith, 12. 
Religious faith not natural, 73. 
Resurrection a doctrine of revela- 
tion, 261-263. 

a spiritual, implies a literal, 265. 
2(j* 


305 

Resurrection in mythology, 272. 
no analogies to, 277. 
not a development, 272. 
not a new creation, 272. 
not a vegetation, 273. 
not improbable to science, 276. 
recent views of, 270, 271. 
testimony of ancients to a, 266- 
269. 

Retrograde development, 167. 
Revelation a matter of fact, 26. 
by visions, words, or impulses, 
98. 

conformable to knowledge of 
the age, 106. 

Revival of literature, 33, 37. 

Rocks of diluvian age, 61. 

Rosetta stone, 153. 

Ruins of nations confirmatory of 
Scripture, 60, 

Rules of interpretation, no, in. 

Scale of existence, 17. 
Scholasticism, 37. 

Science and faith mutual witnesses, 
14. 

defined, n. 
not skeptical, 13. 
not to be constructed from 
Scripture, 108. 
speculations of, 14. 

Scripture chronology, 61-64. 

doctrine of resurrection, 261- 
264. 

history the source of tradition, 
73 - 

representation of God, 125. 
Scriptures a complete system, 93, 
99, no. 

the utterances of Divine ideas, 
93 * 


30 6 


Index. 


Seeming contradictions of Scrip- 
ture, 107. 

Sensation, 197. 

Sensational experience no source 
of religion, 78. 

Sextus, 35. 

Silliman, Prof., on geology and 
Scripture, 155. 

Sir Isaac Newton on necessity, 124. 
Skepticism of Shelley, Byron, etc., 
42. 

Sleep, 211. 

Socrates on the soul, 184. 

Somatic death, 191. 

vitality, 191. 

Somnambulism, 212. 

Sophists, 35. 

Soul distinct from body, 179. 

Scripture account of the, 179. 
sensation and volition require 
a, 195- 

Sources of physiology, 181. 
Spectrum analysis, 143. 

Spencer's philosophy, 188. 

Sphere of conscience, 242. 

Spinosa, 40. 

Spirit of an interpreter of Scrip- 
ture, 115. 

Spiritual communications not im- 
probable, 94. 

functions in man, 242. 
impulses, 100. 

Spiritualism, 123, 247, 251. 
Statutes of Adam, 56. 

St. Augustine on Divine omnipo- 
tence, 140. 

Subjective argument for inspira- 
tion, 101. 

Supernatural, the, 14. 

Superstition a distortion of truth, 
254- 


Supreme Being undiscoverable by 
reason, 78. 

unknown to some, 71. 
Swedenborgian doctrine of resur- 
rection, 272. 

Telescope, discoveries of the, 143. 
Tendencies of free thought, 48. 
Tertullian on inspiration, 91. 

Tests of Divine impulses, 256, 257. 
Thales, 35, 122. 

Theophany the oldest form of 
revelation, 95. 

Theories of life, 183. 

Theory of vital fluid, 186. 

Trance, 251. 

Trinity in unity, 131. 

True idea of resurrection, 275. 
Truth the test of inspiration, 108, 
109. 

Unbelief destructive, 13. 
Unconsciousness not death, 199, 
200. 

Unreasonableness of objectors, 232, 
233- 

Use of reason, 225. 

Variations among inspired men, 
93- 

Variety of spiritual existences, 192. 
Vedas, 35. 

Verbal revelation, 100. 

Vicarious sacrifice common, 233, 
234- 

sacrifice the glory of history, 
234- 

Vision of creation to Moses, 137. 

Writers of Scripture not unlearned, 
108. 


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By jf. E. Garrets on, M.D. 

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lessons of wisdom from all passing 
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's Liebcr, LL.D. New and 
Theodore D. Woolsey, LL.D. 
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and political science of our country 
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The Life of Benjamin Franklin . Written by Himself. 

Embracing a brief account of his Ancestors, and an Auto- 
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his original manuscripts, printed correspondence, and other 
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Hazlitt' s Life of Napoleon. The Life of Napoleon 
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Life of “ Stonezvall" Jackson. Life of Gen' l Thomas 

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Philosophers and Fools. A Study. By Julia Duhr- 


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Pen Pictures of Europe. Where and How We Went 


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On Punctuation. A Handbook of Punctuation, con • 

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much larger pretensions.” — Washing- 
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. . We commend this little book to 

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The Concordance to Shakespeare' s Poems. An Index 

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patience, care, and industry necessary 
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worthy of the highest praise; and the 
volume shows that Mrs. Furness is as 
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PUBLICATIONS OF J. B. LIPPINCOTT Se CO. 


NOW COMPLETE, IN FIFTEEN VOLUMES. 

» ^ * 

THE 

NEW standard edition 

OF 

PRESCOTT’S WORKS 

WITH THE 

Author’s Latest Corrections and Additions, 

EDITED BY 

JOHU FOSTE EL KIR 

- < •»- 

as follows: 

HISTORY OF FERDINAND AND ISABELLA, 

3 Volumes. 

HISTORY OF THE CONQUEST OF MEXICO, 

3 Volumes. 

HISTORY OF THE CONQUEST OF PERU, 

Volumes. 

HISTORY OF THE REIGN OF PHILIP II., 

3 Volumes. 

HISTORY OF THE REIGN OF CHARLES V., 

3 Volumes. 

PRESCOTT’S MISCELLANEOUS ESSAYS, 

1 Volume. 




This Edition is Illustrated with Maps, Plates, and Engravings. 
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